The Canadian, the first North American ever to be ranked as the sport's top player, was unveiled last week as part of a new scheme designed to help raise awareness of squash as it launches a campaign to get onto the Olympic programme for 2020.

But insidethegames revealed that he had only just completed a nine-month drugs ban after testing positive for recreational drugs.

"The WSF has today withdrawn Jonathon Power from its Ambassador Development Tour to Latvia later this year," they said in a statement.

Earlier, when first approached by insidethegames about the ban, which the WSF had never published, they had promised to stand by Power.

They had claimed that it was "pretty irrelevant" and they had "appointed him as a member of the 'Ambassador Programme' in full knowledge of this incident".

But, after we published our story, there was a dramatic shift in their attitude.

"The WSF takes a zero tolerance approach to drugs," a WSF spokesman said.

"Sadly, we have concluded that given Jonathon failed in a test for a recreational drug, even though it came well after his official retirement as a Professional Squash Association player, we could not invite him to be part of the Ambassador Development Tour.

"Squash has an exemplary track record of being a drug free sport and we are absolutely committed to maintaining this."

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