{"id":71478,"date":"2025-05-03T15:29:12","date_gmt":"2025-05-03T15:29:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/71478\/"},"modified":"2025-05-03T15:29:12","modified_gmt":"2025-05-03T15:29:12","slug":"south-africa-cricket-superstar-reveals-hes-serving-provisional-drugs-ban","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/71478\/","title":{"rendered":"South Africa cricket superstar reveals he’s serving provisional drugs ban"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kagiso Rabada is currently ranked as the second best bowler in the world by the International Cricket Council Test, but the 29-year-old is currently serving a provisional suspension after testing positive for a recreational drugSouth Africa’s Kagiso Rabada has revealed he’s currently serving a drugs ban(Image: PA)<\/p>\n

South Africa superstar Kagiso Rabada revealed he is serving a provisional suspension after testing positive for a recreational drug. Rabada, who sits second in the International Cricket Council<\/a> Test bowling rankings, went back home after playing just two matches with Gujarat Titans in the Indian Premier League<\/a> last month.<\/p>\n

The Titans said at the time he had done so to tend to an \u201cimportant personal matter\u201d and the 29-year-old disclosed this was due to returning an adverse analytical finding for a recreational substance. Rabada expressed his regret at his actions and is already looking at drawing a line under the incident although it is unclear when he will be able to resume his career.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am deeply sorry to all those that I have let down,\u201d he said in a statement released by the South African Cricketers\u2019 Association (SACA),<\/a> the country\u2019s players\u2019 union. \u201cI will never take the privilege of playing cricket<\/a> for granted. This privilege is much larger than me. It goes beyond my personal aspirations.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am serving a provisional suspension and I am looking forward to returning to the game I love playing.<\/p>\n

\u201cI couldn\u2019t have gone through this alone. I\u2019d like to thank my agent, Cricket South Africa (CSA) and Gujarat Titans for their support. I\u2019d also like to thank SACA and my legal team for their guidance and counsel. Most importantly I\u2019d like to thank my friends and family for their understanding and love.<\/p>\n

READ MORE: England to field inexperienced attack as they name first Test squad of the summer<\/a>READ MORE: Freddie Flintoff ‘so proud’ as refugee star of hit BBC show makes cricket debut<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cMoving forward, this moment will not define me. I will keep doing what I have always done, continuously working hard and playing with passion and devotion to my craft.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rabada underlined his status as South Africa\u2019s pace spearhead and one of the world<\/a> \u2019s finest bowlers when he became the quickest to reach 300 Test wickets in terms of balls bowled in October last year.<\/p>\n

He briefly shot back up to the top of the ICC\u2019s Test bowling standings, having first gone to the summit in January 2018, but he has since been leapfrogged by India\u2019s Jasprit Bumrah.<\/p>\n

Rabada has taken 327 wickets at an average of 22 from just 70 Tests while he has amassed a further 168 dismissals in 108 ODIs and 71 in 65 T20 internationals.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Kagiso Rabada is currently ranked as the second best bowler in the world by the International Cricket Council…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":71479,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4101],"tags":[1406,6667,8422,5710,12648,35719,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-71478","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cricket","8":"tag-cricket","9":"tag-indian-premier-league","10":"tag-international-cricket-council","11":"tag-ipl","12":"tag-one-day-internationals","13":"tag-south-africa-cricket-team","14":"tag-sports","15":"tag-uk","16":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114444616576922340","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71478","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=71478"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71478\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/71479"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=71478"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=71478"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=71478"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}