Paris: Bulgarian teenager Sesil Karatantcheva faces a two-year ban for allegedly testing positive for steroids at this year’s French Open, a sports daily reported on Tuesday.

The 16-year-old, ranked 39th in the world, defeated Venus Williams on her way to the Roland Garros quarter finals in her debut appearance in the Grand Slam tournament.

The French daily said she tested positive for nandrolone and was called before a three-man International Tennis Federation (ITF) doping panel in London last week.

Men’s singles runner-up Mariano Puerta, the world No.1, and fellow Argentine doubles specialist Mariano Hood have also allegedly failed drugs tests at the French Open.

No comment can be expected from the ITF which, like the men’s governing body the ATP, does not comment on doping cases until all appeals procedures are completed.

Karatantcheva, who learnt English by listening to the British pop band Spice Girls, was uprooted from Sofia to Florida when she was 12 to learn her tennis.

She beat Williams ' seeded 11th at this year’s French Open ' 6-3, 1-6, 6-1 when she was still 15.

The Bulgarian, who speaks with a distinct American southern drawl, won the French Open junior title in 2004.