Beijing or bust - Chambers will retire if Olympic ban stands

Dwain Chambers will retire if he does not win the right on Friday to represent Britain in the Olympic Games next month, his counsel Jonathan Crystal claimed dramatically in the High Court on Thursday

The disgraced sprinter will discover on Friday morning whether, after returning from the path he took to sporting shame, he will be set on another to sporting oblivion.

Justice Sir Colin Mackay’s adjudication will come at 10.30am in Court 76, where on Thursday he sat for four hours and 10 minutes as authorities as diverse as Baron Pierre de Coubertin and St Luke were quoted to support arguments for and against allowing Chambers to sprint in the 100 metres in Beijing.

Chambers is seeking a temporary injunction against the BOA’s bylaw which forbids selection for life to anybody who has served a suspension from competition for a doping offence.

A two-year ban was imposed on Chambers after he tested positive for THG in 2003.

His counsel argued that the BOA’s life ban is a restraint of trade because the Olympics can bring benefits, is unfair because he had served his punishment already and disproportionate because it is for life.

David Pannick, QC, countered that he should not have delayed until the 11th hour making his challenge, that other athletes in last weekend’s Olympic trials competed in the honest belief that Chambers was ineligible and that one of them should not be deprived of a place when a full hearing of the case next March is not guaranteed to go in his favour.

He quoted the IOC Charter as calling on countries to pick teams ‘based not only on performance but to serve as an example to the sporting youth of the country’.

‘The BOA is acting properly to take the view that it is appropriate to advance and maintain a bylaw which ensures that a sportsman who has taken prohibited substances to gain an illicit competitive advantage is not someone whom the BOA should regard as one who could serve as an example to the sporting youth of his country,’ he said.

Damage limitation: BOA chairman Lord Moynihan said the British team would be hurt by Chambers' inclusion

Lord Moynihan, the BOA chairman, said in his written submission that the nation’s reputation would be damaged by Chambers’ presence in the team. ‘Team GB could be labelled a team of drug cheats, thereby tarnishing all Team GB athletes,’ he said. ‘That could disincline sponsors to support the London 2012 Games.’

Mr Pannick added: ‘The bylaw sends a very strong and positive message to the youth of the country,’ though he conceded that if it was ruled disproportionate it would be amended quickly, probably into line with the new IOC one-Games ban on those caught doping.

Pannick quoted a speech in London in 1908 by Baron de Coubertin, founder of the modern Olympics, in which he said it was not the winning but the taking part that mattered. By cheating, Chambers had shown himself interested only in the winning.

Crystal countered that Chambers might be seen now as the perfect role model. Quoting Luke’s story of the Prodigal Son, he said: ‘Chambers was plainly lost and it may be said he is now found. He would say that he is a very good role model because he has gone down the pathway of redemption and rehabilitation and may cast light for others on what is the wrong way.’

Chambers had arrived to greetings from a handful of supporters, one sporting a T-shirt proclaiming ‘Chambers v Hypocrisy’.

He followed the arguments but his only contribution to proceedings came when he said ‘Tyrone Edgar’ to prompt his counsel on the name of the athlete who finished fourth in the Olympic Trials and might miss selection for the individual 100m.

But there was a lighthearted moment in the corridor outside the court during the lunch break when he thrust a sandwich into his lawyer’s hand with the words: ‘Eat it. I need you on good form this afternoon.’