Conor Benn’s career is in limbo… what happens when the biggest names in boxing fail drugs tests?

Conor Benn’s grudge match with Chris Eubank Jr was officially called off Thursday after the first tested positive for the banned substance clomiphene.

Benn’s failed drug test came to light on Wednesday, with the British Boxing Board of Control (BBBoC) announcing shortly afterwards that they were fighting Eubank Jr.

Matchroom and Wasserman – the event’s co-promoters – tried to continue the fight, but eventually announced the postponement just two days before the pair were due to meet in the ring.

What happens next for Benn is currently unclear. Matchroom and Wasserman have labeled the BBBC’s decision not to sanction the fight as “procedural flaws” and plan to take legal action against the organization.

Meanwhile, Benn has maintained his innocence and vowed to clear his name, insisting he is a “clean athlete.”

But is there a precedent for combatants testing positive for banned substances? Below, Sports post looks back on five high-profile boxers who have returned positive tests in the past, and what happened in each of their cases.

Roy Jones Jr

Roy Jones Jr is widely regarded as one of the best fighters of his generation, but his career was not without controversy.

In May 2000, Jones Jr. defended his world light-heavyweight titles against Richard Hall, stopping his opponent in the 11th round.

After the fight, however, he tested positive for the banned substance Androstenedione – a steroid hormone. Interestingly, Hall also tested positive for the exact same substance.

The fight took place in Indianapolis, and Indiana boxing commissioner Jacob Hall said Jones Jr tested “five or six times above an acceptable level.”

Jones Jr claimed that the substance entered his system after taking the supplement Ripped Fuel.

The four-weight world champion was never suspended and his win over Hall was allowed to stand. Less than four months later, he returned to the ring to defend his titles again.

Tyson Fury

Tyson Fury disrupted the chances of defeating Wladimir Klitschko in November 2015 to end Ukraine’s dominance of the heavyweight division. But just months before, he tested positive for the banned steroid nandrolone.

Traces of the substance were found in Fury’s February 2015 test, while his cousin and fellow boxer Hughie Fury also returned a positive test the same month.

The pair blamed their failed drug tests on eating contaminated offal, claiming they ate an entire wild boar every week, including the internal organs and entrails.

After a lengthy and expensive legal battle with UKAD, both Furys accepted a two-year ban in December 2017, backdated to December 2015, meaning they were free to fight again shortly after the compromise was reached.

However, the story didn’t end there. In March 2020, a farmer claimed that a member of Fury’s team had offered him £25,000 to lie about providing the British heavyweight with wild boar meat to cover up his failed test.

The farmer, Martin Carefoot, dropped this accusation four months later.

Canelo lvarez

Canelo Alvarez had established himself as one of boxing’s biggest stars when he tested positive for the banned substance clenbuterol twice in February 2018.

The multi-weight world champion claimed that contaminated meat was the cause of his positive test, which was a common problem in his home country at the time.

He was supposed to rematch Gennady Golovkin in May 2018 after their controversial draw the year before, but he was provisionally suspended in April and the fight was cancelled.

First-time violators in Nevada usually get a one-year ban, but Canelo was not given a six-month suspension until he was believed to be cooperating with the commission’s investigation.

His suspension was retroactive to February 2018, meaning he could fight again in August. He finally got back into the ring with Golovkin the following month over the Mexican Independence weekend, claiming a majority decision victory.

The pair completed their trilogy last month, with Canelo winning a comfortable unanimous decision in Las Vegas.

Billy Joe Saunders

Billy Joe Saunders was looking to make a big splash in the States when he returned a negative finding for the banned stimulant oxilofrine ahead of his scheduled fight with Demetrius Andrade in 2018.

The British left-hander claimed the substance came from a nasal spray and there was initial confusion over whether his fight with Andrade would continue.

Under UKAD and WADA doping rules, the substance was allowed ‘out of competition, but prohibited’ in competition, which typically means the day of the fight in the UK and US.

The case came to a head in October 2018, just days before he was scheduled to fight Andrade, when the Massachusetts State Athletic Commission refused to license Saunders to box.

Saunders then left his WBO middleweight title in anticipation of his strip, leaving Andrade to fight Namibia’s Walter Kaautondokwa for the vacant title.

Despite his failed test, Saunders was not suspended and returned to the UK in December 2018 to fight Charles Adamu.

Dillian Whyte

Dillian Whyte tested positive for the banned substance methylhexanamine (MHA) after beating Hungary’s Sandor Balogh in October 2012.

The heavyweight contender claimed the substance had entered his system through the pre-workout drink JACK3D, as he was unaware that the product had been banned from UK stores just weeks earlier.

Whyte argued it was a ‘real mistake’, but an independent National Anti-Doping Panel handed him a two-year ban from October 2012 to October 2014. He challenged the ban in a tribunal but his appeal was dismissed.

Seven years after his first failed drug test, Whyte was back in the spotlight after there was an unfavorable finding in one of his tests prior to his July 2019 clash with Oscar Rivas.

Whyte defeated Rivas by unanimous decision, but the negative finding came to light afterwards and the Briton’s B sample was yet to be tested.

Although he was not suspended from the sport, Whyte was provisionally removed from the WBC rankings after working his way up to a fight with then-champion Deontay Wilder.

After a thorough investigation examining both Whyte’s samples, UKAD determined that the boxer was not to blame for the ‘very low amounts of metabolites’ in his sample, and cleared him of any wrongdoing. They concluded that the positive test was “consistent with an isolated infection.”

Whyte was later reinstated in the WBC rankings and finally took his world title earlier this year, but was defeated by Tyson Fury within six rounds.