GENEVA — Maria Sharapova has been cleared to return to tennis next April after the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) reduced the former world number one’s two-year drugs ban by nine months on Tuesday.Sharapova, who will now be clear to return from April 26 and can play in three of the year’s four grand slams, said she could not wait to get back on court.The 29-year-old Russian, whose case polarised opinion and lost her sponsorship, was handed the original ban — backdated to start on January 26 — by the International Tennis Federation (ITF) following a positive test for the drug meldonium.Meldonium was added to the World Anti-Doping Agency’s (Wada) list of banned substances at the start of the year after mounting evidence that it boosted blood flow and enhanced athletic performance.The arbitration panel reduced the ban to 15 months and found that she "bore some degree of fault" through relying on her agent Max Eisenbud to check the prohibited list for changes and failing to ensure...
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