When Pat McQuaid tried to take a WorldTour licence from Katusha, he failed and made a serious enemy. Brian Cookson is now trying to do the same with Astana after positive dope tests and an audit questioned the team's commitment to ethical cycling. Above, team principal Alexander Vinokourov was caught doping during his career and is now under extreme pressure (Photo: Sirotti)
Now trying to revoke the WorldTour licence of the Astana team, UCI president Brian Cookson needs to learn the lessons of his predecessor Pat McQuaid's efforts to do the same to Katusha, writes Cillian Kelly
Cycling's world governing body, the UCI, has announced that it wants to withdraw the WorldTour license from the Astana team of Tour de France champion Vincenzo Nibali.
The revocation of the license depends on the decision of the UCI's licensing commission.
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But if it is revoked, it means that Astana would no longer automatically receive invites to the world's top races.
Initially, despite five positive tests within the team and its feeder squad over the past year, Astana was reluctantly granted its WorldTour license by the UCI last December.
The UCI said at the time it was beholden to its own rules. And it conceded it did not have sufficient reason to deny Astana the license under those rules.
However, there was a caveat that Astana be subjected to an audit by Lausanne University, under which the team's 'anti-doping culture, policies, structures and management systems' would be tested.
Astana agreed to this condition and now the report arising from the audit is being used by the UCI to request the denial of the WorldTour licence.
The attempt to remove Katusha from the WorldTour spectacularly backfired on Pat McQuaid. The team took a legal challenge and won. The team's wealthy owner and Russian UCI management committee member Igor Makarov then went on to support Brian Cookson in the presidential election where he beat McQuaid.
If the UCI is successful in revoking Astana's licence, it would be quite a coup for current UCI president Brian Cookson.
In Cookson's election manifesto, on which he based his candidacy for his current role, one of the pledges was to 'revolutionise [the UCI's] approach to anti-doping'.
In this section, Cookson stated: “We must not simply focus on riders; the ‘doping enablers’, the managers, team staff and doctors must also be pursued with vigour and appropriate sanctions placed on those found to be complicit in aiding athlete doping.
“Harsher penalties will act as a greater deterrent to the minority that want to cheat.”
Removing an entire team from the top tier of the sport certainly seems like it fits the description of a 'harsher penalty'.
But is it any different to what Cookson's predecessor Pat McQuaid would have done?
In fact, McQuaid did try to do exactly this.
In late 2012, the UCI denied Team Katusha a WorldTour license based on a number of ethical issues such as past doping positives and links with the banned doping doctor Michele Ferrari.
However, Katusha appealed the decision to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) and won.
Brian Cookson's presidency has been short on fireworks, but the UCI's approach to Astana revealed today will silence his critics if it proves successful.
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The Katusha case lasted months and ended up being an embarrassment for the UCI, which was seen to be incapable of adhering to its own rules.
There are similarities between the Katusha case from three years ago and the ongoing Astana case. However, this time around the UCI seems to have been cleverer in its approach.
But while Cookson appears to have been diligent and patient, the process has taken months.
The season is now well underway and the races are coming thick and fast.
A common excuse offered by McQuaid for various problems during his presidency was that his hands were tied by the rules that were in place at the time. And it is as valid an excuse as any.
For legal reasons, the UCI's rules need to be adhered to, especially by the world governing body itself.
And as the Katusha case showed, when the rules are not followed correctly, the UCI leaves itself open to losing court cases.
But what is inexcusable is the UCI being the purveyors of those rules and having the authority to change them and not doing so.
After the Katusha debacle, McQuaid did not move to sufficiently tighten up the WorldTour licensing rules so that this situation would not arise again.
Cookson, having been elected in McQuaid's place, also failed to change these rules.
Astana was riding high just last July with Vincenzo Nibali's Tour de France win. However, with positive doping tests by others on the team since then, it is under heavy fire from the UCI and faces a fight to even survive (Photo: Sirotti)
Cookson has learned from mistakes of the past and while there will no doubt be a challenge from Astana to CAS; it looks like the UCI may have played its cards right this time.
But the time it has taken to do this means that all of Astana's staff - from riders to soigneurs and directeurs sportif - may all be out of a job whether they have been involved in doping or not.
If the license had been denied last November, there was a chance that all of these people could have found employment elsewhere.
Now, already two months into 2015, with other teams' budgets all accounted for, finding a berth somewhere else for this year will be extremely difficult.
However, if the WoldTour licence was revoked, it is not clear if Astana could continue to exist at a lower level.
Doping scandals are undoubtedly damaging for the sport. But the time they take to resolve can be equally as damaging.
The UCI ultimately can't control who chooses to dope and who doesn't. But it can control how long it takes to resolve issues like this when they arise.
If Cookson doesn't move to change the WorldTour licensing rules in the very near future so that future licensing decisions can be made quickly and with clarity, then all of this will have been for nothing.
Cillian Kelly is a cycling writer and commentator. He publishes the Irish Peloton website.
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