(Sports) Two footballers from Australia's biggest club given two-year drug ban

Two football players at Australia's biggest sporting club have been banned from all sports for two years after testing positive to the prohibited drug clenbuterol.

Josh Thomas and Lachie Keefe, from the Collingwood Magpies in Australia's native football league, the AFL, announced on Monday that they would accept the bans imposed by the Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority.

Collingwood, the biggest and most powerful football club in Australia, has also announced it would be cutting the players from its squad.

The bans have been backdated to March this year - when the pair were first provisionally suspended - meaning both Keefe and Thomas are ineligible to play any form of competitive sport until March 2017.

Clenbuterol is a substance which aides breathing and oxygen intake, and is banned by the World Anti-Doping Authority (WADA).

The players believe they unknowingly and accidentally consumed clenbuterol when taking another illicit substance while at a festival in February.

Collingwood chief executive officer Gary Pert said on Monday both the club and the players had agreed to the sanctions.

"We accept this was a case of two young men who made poor decisions to consume illicit drugs, a decision they will regret forever," Pert told the press conference.

"They have let down their families and their teammates, and they have damaged their reputation."

However Pert admitted the pair could be redrafted once the bans are lifted, saying there could be "light at the end of the tunnel" for both Thomas and Keefe.

The news is the latest controversy surrounding the AFL and doping allegations; Fremantle Dockers player Ryan Crowley was suspended in June for 12 months for taking a non-prescribed painkiller in 2014, while Essendon Football Club is still facing an appeal lodged by WADA regarding the controversial drug supplements program the club ran during 2012 and 2013. Endi