Guilty or innocent, Shayna Jack’s black mark paints bleak financial future

One of the most marketable swimmers in the country a week ago, Shayna Jack could be left in financial ruin as the ISL and sponsors prepare to cut ties with the young swimmer before she has a chance to clear her name.

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Shayna Jack could be left penniless - even if she can prove that her adverse doping samples were caused by an innocent mistake - because the commercial world is preparing to ditch her before she has a chance to clear her name.

One of the most marketable swimmers in the country just a week ago, that’s the brutal reality now facing Jack, even though she protests her innocence and still hasn’t had her day in court.

Nervous sponsors are already making plans to bail on her while she is facing an anxious wait to see if the volunteer ambassadorial roles she has promoting issues she’s passionate about, including youth swimming, animal welfare and protecting the Great Barrier Reef, decide they don’t want to be associated with her.

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Shayna Jack faces a long legal battle. Picture: Instagram

And she can forget about any future commercial opportunities that would have opened up if she won an Olympic gold medal in Tokyo next year with the Australian relay team that she set the world record in last year.

Those doors are already being shut in her face, even more so because of the way Swimming Australia botched the announcement of her test results and left her to carry the can and some hefty bills for what could be a long and complicated legal stoush.

Still just 20 and with her best years ahead of her, Jack is now facing a life ban from the new global professional swimming league that wants to revolutionise the sport in the same way Big Bash transformed cricket.

Jack was one of star signings for the San Francisco-based Cali Condors, one of the eight franchises that will compete in the breakaway International Swimming League (ISL), but has already been told she’s been suspended until her case is decided.

Even if she succeeds in proving that her positive test was an innocent mistake and she gets a heavily reduced ban, she’ll still be regarded as a doping offender in the same way that Thomas Fraser-Holmes has a permanent mark against his name simply because he wasn’t at home when the drug testers turned up at his door.

And under the ISL’s one strike and you’re out rule, that means she’ll be banned forever.

“As I said last month, no doping control rules violation will be overlooked,” said Andrea di Nino, the managing director of the International Swimming League, in a statement confirming Jack’s immediate suspension.

“This is another case that serves to reiterate our stance on banned substances and breaking doping control rules – no such behaviour will ever be condoned.

“From the outset, the ISL has been an advocate for transparency and clean sport. Any athletes with doping control or ethical violation records will be considered ineligible with no recourse.”

Jason Lezak, the general manager of the Cali Condors who signed Jack, Ariarne Titmus, Mitch Larkin and Jack Cartwright, said the strict rule was non-negotiable.

“We are committed to a doping-free future at the ISL and we completely support the League’s enforcement of its policies,” he said.

Originally published as Guilty or innocent, Shayna Jack’s black mark paints bleak financial future