From a skill POV, in Football (of any code) if you take EPO you can keep running for longer, this won't help you ,,,,,,,,,, run round the opposition.
Yes it would.
I think I see what you did there, but I disagree. Running about in circles for 45 mins will not give you a significant level of fatigue that EPO will alleviate. In association footy you don't get a significant drop at the end of matches unless you're in a cup tie with teams in very different leagues. You'll see this more often in Rugby, but there it's fatigue that makes them make wrong decisions or drop passes. I don't think EPO will help with that either.
Do correct me if I'm wrong.
Check the numbers. Football is basically a game of repeated sprints, and aerobic capacity can help you recover quicker and stop you needing to burn so much per sprint. Players get bought/sold based in part on how much distance they can cover (at a certain speed). The sprinting bit is really important - at Liverpool Charlie Adam used to cover vast distances, but incredibly slowly, meaning he was nearly in the right place for the entire game! It's entirely possible to judge your effort and pace yourself, but if it means choosing to not track a run then you are going to get into trouble. Here's an article with some actual numbers:
https://www.skysports.com/football/news/11661/11996016/premier-league-running-stats-this-season-revealedIt's not just at the end of games, you can see a trend in the numbers from about 30-45 minutes and then from about 60 minutes onwards. As well as reducing your ability to run, fatigue also impacts on fine motor control and decision making, so it impacts on the execution of skills too.
The other area where drugs help athletes, especially those in sports where there are a lot of games and the season is long is in recovery from injury, and masking the pain so you can play through injury. The number of NFL players who end their career addicted to painkillers is significant - missing a game could mean losing your place and having your million dollar contract ended.