Enrica’s association is in crisis after the players take drugs
A year ago the guys on a successful ice hockey team started talking about a new drug they had discovered.
Now the abuse is rampant and the results are below.
– Oscar says that one of the boys pulled up a line during the break.
He’s gone fast.
Oscar shakes his head and folds his hood to protect himself from the cold wind. There at the ice rink, he heard about the crystal for the first time last year. One team member described the new drug as a cheaper version of cocaine, something that could be snorted at weekend parties without the risk of causing a hangover at a Sunday game.
During the season, talk of drugs became more common and more open in the locker room. His colleagues bragged about what they took. By the spring of 2022, other players seemed to have tested and soon began buying crystals from each other.
But it only escalated in the summer when some of the team participated, took drugs and missed pre-season training. The club was aware of what was happening but did nothing at the time. I think they wanted more concrete evidence, says Oscar.
It affects the whole team.
The old club has an outstanding team of seniors whose talents are always given opportunity. And the growth looked good because year after year the fledgling team was at the top of the league.
But this winter the losses piled up and the juniors are in the bottom tier of the table. For Oscar, it’s not strange to take into account what happens in the dressing room.
– It went really bad this year. We are underperforming. If you’re taking drugs and partying, your body doesn’t feel right and then you can’t play hockey. He says it affects the whole team.
Smoke flows from Oscar’s mouth when he speaks. But he also takes breaks to reflect on his answers. He explains that he does not want to exaggerate, but rather to reproduce what he saw as straight as possible.
He pondered for a while whether it was right to do this interview. He loves his club, or at least felt a strong love for him, but what happened this winter has made him despair. He believes that the situation is grave and that the measures are insufficient.
“In training, before matches, between matches…”
When Sportbladet wrote about the club’s problems last week, the sporting director explained that drugs are primarily a social problem, but that “some of our players may have tried”, something the club takes very seriously.
Oscar wants us to understand that the reality is harsher than it seemed in that article.
The weather was fine at the start of the current season. Then the results came against us and then escalated with the drugs, he said.
Do players only take crystals at parties?
– No. It happened on the bus outside of matches. He’s been in training, before games, in between games, after games.
in your dressing room?
– yes. It could be anything from going to the toilet to picking up a bank card queue and taking it to its place.
And did you see that?
– yes.
There is a culture of silence.
It’s not something you just heard someone say happens?
– No. I saw someone carrying a bag of white crystals. He had it with him in his inner pocket. It’s easily available in town and I think someone said you have to pay 400kr for a line.
Did you take drugs?
– No.
How did you hear about the award?
– Because there are open negotiations between the players. I know that they go away after training, take a few hundred banknotes and buy from each other. The team is sold out a lot, so they owe each other a debt.
How many players do you think use drugs?
– I started with two, but will expand to four or five while taking it regularly. And that the seven or eight did it over and over again.
There are many of you who do not use drugs. Why didn’t you speak when the crystal came into the dressing room?
– It’s hard to explain, but we, other guys who don’t use drugs, were shocked. At first we didn’t dare tell the coaches what it was like. In the team there is a culture of silence. You work things out on your own and get up, you don’t want to catch a cold. This became a stressful situation and eventually drugs became an everyday thing.
What did the leaders say?
– They sit in a completely different place in the hall, far from the changing room. Once they got off, there was complete silence in the dressing room.
Medicines are not disinfected
He must have gotten to them in the end?
– yes. There have been some players who have gone to the coach and said that’s the way it is. Then outside help was brought in. Before training on the ice, three girls from a reception came up and met us. They described what happened to drug addicts and the debts they could take on.
The club has done more than that. They have continued to work with the front desk to get to the bottom of the issue and two weeks ago they called the parents for a meeting about prevalence of drug use. They reported, according to Sportbladet’s information, that seven or eight players had taken drugs and that they had to provide urine samples.
It was said that at least two players had to leave the club due to their addiction and two others quit in protest.
But Oscar, whose real name is something else, doesn’t think meetings and occasional exclusions are enough. According to him, the main problem remains in the association, and the drugs are not prepared because some teenagers disappear.
– No, so far the measures have not had much effect at all, I would say. He says they have a policy that drug users are not welcome.
Do they adhere to this policy?
– Absolutely. of course not.
Are people you know who do drugs still around?
– yes.
How does it make you feel?
– invaluable.
Sportbladet allowed the club to read Oscar’s testimonial. They didn’t want to answer any questions before posting.