vallierojas: David Millar has paid for his doping, now he suffers for his sport

David Millar could probably challenge his lifetime Olympic ban but the BOA has common sense on its side, if not the law

Without David Millar's help, Mark Cavendish might not have become the first British cyclist in 46 years to win the men's road race world championship in Copenhagen last month. Acting as the "road captain" of the eight-strong team, Millar ensured that each rider did the job allocated to him in order to put Cavendish in the best possible position as the race neared the finish line. The 34-year-old Scot would like the opportunity to do the same thing next summer, when Cavendish will be the favourite to win Britain's first gold medal of the 2012 Olympic Games.

As things stand, however, Millar will be unable to compete in London's great festival of sport, thanks to the lifetime ban imposed by the British Olympic Association after he admitted using EPO to French police in 2004. His confession led to a statutory two-year suspension by British Cycling, his sport's national governing body, which he completed in time to ride in the 2006 Tour de France. Since then he has won stages in major races and taken the gold medal in the time trial at last year's Commonwealth Games, riding for Scotland.

The Olympic ban is imposed on all British athletes found to have used performance-enhancing drugs. It is a unilateral sanction that has attracted criticism for its uncompromising nature, but the BOA says it enjoys the support of 90% of those who do not want to find themselves competing against people known to have attempted to take an unfair advantage.

Now Millar believes that a ruling by the court of arbitration for sport in Lausanne last week offers him hope. Deliberating on the case of the United States sprinter LaShawn Merritt, the CAS overturned the International Olympic Committee's ban on anyone suspended for more than six months from the next Games, calling it "invalid and unenforceable". In Millar's view, the decision undermines the validity of his own life ban.

He has yet to make up his mind on whether to take the step of challenging the BOA, and his decision will be based in part on the response of British Cycling, whose performance director, Dave Brailsford, helped him through the original ordeal. Brailsford, however, is also the team principal of Sky Procycling, which explicitly refuses to hire riders with past doping convictions.

Few athletes can have come back from a doping ban and done more to campaign against the use of performance-enhancing drugs. Cycling has done a great deal to clean itself up in the past few years and Millar has done everything one could ask for, and more, to help ensure that others do not fall into trap that snared him back at the moment when he saw that most of his rivals were "preparing" themselves in unorthodox ways and concluded that the only answer was to join in.

At some point, however, he may have to accept the need to go on paying a price for his past mistake. Redemption is a worthy aim, and Millar has earned praise for achieving it. But to lift the barrier all the way carries the risk of telling those who would break the rules that the sanctions are limited.

The BOA is right to take steps to protect its athletes from the terrible feeling of having been beaten unfairly. A sanction with a time limit would merely encourage some competitors, particularly younger ones, to take the risk of cheating. That was how Ben Johnson thought in the early 1990s, when he twice tested positive for banned substances after coming back from the two-year ban imposed following the 1988 Olympics. It was how Riccardo Ricc� ? a former team?mate of Millar ? was thinking last year, when he returned to competition after serving a ban and was promptly admitted to hospital, allegedly having tried to give himself a blood transfusion.

Millar is probably correct to believe that, in the light of the Merritt ruling, he would probably win an appeal. The real question is whether it would be the right thing to do. In my view, he would do better to accept that he is continuing to suffer not for his own past misdemeanour but for the good of sport as a whole. He can do everything but ride in the Olympics. It could have been worse.

New Zealand may be small but it's a heroic host

There are stern warnings in New Zealand that this is the last time the country will be able to host the Rugby World Cup on its own. A nation of four million people apparently cannot provide enough income for the needs of the event's owner, the International Rugby Board. How absurd that seems. The tournament has taken place in pleasant cities and decent stadiums, with just the right number of visiting fans ? not too many to swamp the host cities, but enough to add some colour ? and a level of interest among the local population ranging from deep fanaticism to polite indifference, which is exactly how it should be.

Time for Vettel to put away his pointless finger

Now that Sebastian Vettel has become the youngest double champion in Formula One history, proving beyond doubt that his success in 2010 was no fluke, perhaps he could be persuaded to put away the raised index finger with which he salutes his victories. Vettel has an appealing character in most respects, but that gesture is an unnecessary irritant ? as is his habit of squealing into his helmet microphone in moments of exultation. "Yes, baby, that's what I'm talking about!" is the sort of thing one would expect to hear from James Brown rather than a grand prix champion who has just secured pole position.

Still no new spots on this leopard, Rooney reveals

That petulant kick at a Montenegrin opponent on Friday told us that, for all the protestations made on his behalf, Wayne Rooney has not really changed at all. Which means that, by next summer, anything could have happened ? including a return to the state in which he travelled to South Africa in the summer of 2010, when England's most potent player barely resembled a professional footballer at all. Perhaps, by the time the party arrives in Poland, Fabio Capello will be better prepared to take the necessary action.