Lausanne (AFP)

Convicted of doping, he was believed to be finished for the high level.

But thanks to yet another twist, Chinese swimmer Sun Yang will play his place at the Tokyo Olympics on Tuesday against the Court of Arbitration for Sport.

At 29, the three-time Olympic champion has a final chance to justify the destruction with hammer blows of a vial of his blood, during an unexpected doping control in 2018.

In February 2020, the CAS had nevertheless imposed an eight-year suspension for this gesture, the maximum penalty, marking the end of a career as tumultuous in the pools as outside.

But to general amazement, the Swiss Federal Court overturned this decision in December, sanctioning the "partiality" of the president of the panel of arbitrators and former head of Italian diplomacy, Franco Frattini.

Denouncing the cruelty inflicted on animals in China, while the Sun Yang case was under investigation, the magistrate had indeed engaged in a series of "extremely violent" and racist tweets, the Court revealed.

So here is the swimmer again before the supreme sports court, for a videoconference hearing and closed to the media between Tuesday and Thursday, before a decision on an undisclosed date.

- Icon in his country -

The stake is clear: the Chinese Swimming Federation has specified that the athletes titled at the 2019 Worlds in Gwangju would be "automatically qualified" for the Tokyo Games (July 23-August 8).

Sun Yang, who then won two world titles in the 200m and 400m freestyle, meets these criteria, even if nothing filters in China concerning his physical level and the state of his preparation.

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The only son of a family of athletes, the swimmer revealed himself to the general public during the 2011 Shanghai World Championships: at 19, he smashed the world record in the 1,500-meter freestyle, which he has since improved and still holds, and had also won the 800 meters.

Adored in his country and muse of the big brands, he added three Olympic gold medals to his record, in London-2012 (400 m and 1,500 m freestyle), then Rio-2016 (200 m), and has a total of eleven world titles.

But in 2014 and in the greatest secrecy, he was suspended for three months for testing positive for a stimulant (trimetazidine), a sanction made public long after she was served.

Two years later, during the Rio Olympics, the hostility of his rivals, which had been simmering for a long time, had come to light: the Australian Mack Horton had first described him as "doped", before stealing the gold in the 400m freestyle.

- Outcast of the podiums -

Usually unwavering, the Chinese swimmer broke down in tears and retaliated by winning the 200m.

"Sun Yang, he pisses purple", had in the meantime mocked the French backstroke Camille Lacourt, "disgusted to see people who cheated on the catwalks".

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Controlled at his home in September 2018, Sun Yang had destroyed a blood sample with a hammer, arguing in his defense that the inspectors had not produced "documents proving their identity".

The International Swimming Federation (Fina) had yet cleared the swimmer due to a defect in form - before being disowned by the CAS in its decision of 2020 -, allowing him to appear at the Worlds-2019, to the dismay of some opponents.

"I do not want to see this guy compete at the Worlds or the Olympics against my partners who work very hard to be there", had launched on Twitter the Briton Adam Peaty, Olympic champion in the 100m breaststroke.

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Medalists alongside him in the 400m and 200m respectively, Australian Mack Horton refused to stand on the podium, while Briton Duncan Scott refused to shake his hand.

"You're a loser, I'm a winner!" Sun retorted, exasperated, clenching his fist in Scott's direction.

© 2021 AFP