Australian swimming legend Grant Hackett slams cover up of bombshell Chinese doping scandal from Tokyo Games

Grant Hackett has taken a swipe at the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and China over a bombshell Chinese doping scandal from the Tokyo Olympics that could result in Aussie women being promoted to silver medallists.

It was revealed on Saturday that 23 Chinese swimmers tested positive for a banned substance before the Olympics but were still cleared to compete.

The tests were all collected in January 2021, ahead of the Tokyo Games where the swim team won three gold medals and six overall.

All 23 positives were for trimetazidine, a medicine normally used to prevent angina attacks — and the same substance which saw teenage figure skater Kamila Valieva banned for four years.

In response WADA, the World Anti-Doping Agency, said they had accepted Chinese officials' decision to clear the swimmers, claiming their food had been contaminated.

The news means Ariarne Titmus, Mollie O'Callaghan, Leah Neale, and Madi Wilson who won bronze medals in the women's 4x200m freestyle relay might be promoted to silver.

'You can't come out and obviously tarnish everyone as a drug cheat immediately but it's very suspect given the circumstances and the fact it wasn't disclosed and transparent that's the thing that makes it more suspicious than anything else,' Hackett told the Herald Sun. 

'It's like well if there is nothing to hide why aren't we disclosing that there was a process undertaken, that there was people that essentially tested positive but there was contamination so there was nothing to see here and there was follow up tests perhaps around it and whatever else that needs to be discussed around the situation like that should have been revealed (at the time).

'The fact we are sitting here what three years later and it's only coming out now through the wrong channels, not through official channels, just makes me feel very unsettled.'

Aussie swimmer Shayna Jack was banned from competing for testing positive to a banned substance in 2019, which later was proven to be due to substance contamination.

Unlike the Chinese swimmers, Jack missed out on the Games and had to fight to save her tattered career.

Hackett says he feels for the Chinese athletes involved too - who might also potentially be victims. 

 'I actually feel for multiple athletes in this situation,' Hackett said.

'If no one has done anything wrong but there wasn't a transparent process, those people are going to be tarnished with that brush.

'Then if there was people that were doing the wrong things and taking performance enhancing supplements or banned supplements, then what about the athletes sitting down with the wrong medals around their neck.

'The third layer there I go people like Shayna or other people who have had issues with contaminated samples or you know have gone through their difficult times in relation to these matters yet have had a different set of cards dealt to them versus someone else.

'That lack of consistency and what you call basically a double standard is the thing that makes you feel really uneasy.'