The KHL has announced that the league’s anti-doping program has returned and will begin testing again. The program was temporarily suspended due to the Russian anti-doping agency (RUSADA)’ s inavailability during the Sochi Olympics and Paralympic games. The KHL also announced that inspector Valentine Kozin has being suspended.
According to the league, the KHL anti-doping team will start working fully at the beginning of next week. They will restart all needed procedures for doping control, which were temporarily halted until today.
The Russian anti-doping agency (RUSADA) was working on analysis for Olympic and Paraolympic games in Sochi and because of that were not avaible to provide their regular services to the KHL. The suspension of the program was announced at the same time as positive test results for Latvian players Vitalijs Pavlovs and Ralfs Freibergs. No further announcements have been made as their cases are being adjudicated. In the meantime Freibergs is continuing to play for his college team. However, Pavlovs has missed time and didn’t help his team, Dinamo Riga, in their first round KHL playoff matchup.
In other news, the KHL has suspended game inspector (video review official) Valentine Kozin from his duties . Kozin has earned KHL attention because of a poor call in a playoff game between Prague Lev and Donetsk Donbass, where a goal was awarded incorrectly. On the video it can be clearly seen that the puck hit the post and didn’t cross the goal line, but according to the 73-year-old Kozin it was a good goal. (Previously Kozin was a referee and worked under IIHF)
The league earlier admitted that a mistake was made and suspended Kozin until the end of the season. The league’s referee department will also be doing an investigation. It is not first time in these playoffs that an official has been suspended, as four referees were disciplined for bad calls during the CKSA Moscow and SKA Saint Petersburg first round series.
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