Pressure from football and cycling has forced the IOC to back off from proposals for a fixed minimum two-year sanction for first-time drug offenders. The decision leaves sport facing an enormous anomaly which could easily mitigate in favour of Michelle de Bruin's appeal to the Court for Arbitration in Sport (CAS) later this year.

De Bruin allegedly tampered with a urine sample in her home in Kilkenny last year and was subsequently banned by swimming governing body FINA for four years. Most sports do not ban athletes for four years even if they are caught red-handed with a hypodermic full of goodies.

The severity of de Bruin's ban is in stark contrast to the simpering noises being made by football and cycling and also in contrast to the way other sports stars have been treated. In tennis, Petr Korda walked having tested positive for nandrolone and in athletics Denis Mitchell was granted a reprieve for an excessive testosterone level - too much sex and beer was his excuse.

Regardless of de Bruin's guilt or innocence, CAS might have to ask themselves how it would look to uphold such a severe ban given what is going on all around them in other sports.