Luis Suarez - scumbag

[cmonurz]

Agree with most of that except the Terry matter has been made an official police matter and suarez was strictly the FA right? So if the police find terry not guilty, then the FA by common sense would not need to take action and he would be cleared.

Presumably you would disagree with that, should it transpire.

A point that has already been made - if the context of what Suarez said is not important in relation to this charge, then nor should it be the context in which Terry said it. And as has also already been pointed out, the evidence required for the CPS to charge Terry will be more than that required for an FA charge similar to Suarez's (again, if we take your point that it is the utterance of the unacceptable words that is the issue).

Fwiw, for me, context is important to the severity of any punishment - there should definitely be one, in both cases, but 8 games for 'pal' in Spanish, albeit an unfriendly one, or 'I didn't call you a black cnut', is too much, imho.

[Bandini]

Finerain as the voice of reason in this thread.

[TheMaraudingDog]

Context doesn't wash at all.

[FiNeRaIn]

Agree with most of that except the Terry matter has been made an official police matter and suarez was strictly the FA right? So if the police find terry not guilty, then the FA by common sense would not need to take action and he would be cleared.

Presumably you would disagree with that, should it transpire.

A point that has already been made - if the context of what Suarez said is not important in relation to this charge, then nor should it be the context in which Terry said it. And as has also already been pointed out, the evidence required for the CPS to charge Terry will be more than that required for an FA charge similar to Suarez's (again, if we take your point that it is the utterance of the unacceptable words that is the issue).

Fwiw, for me, context is important to the severity of any punishment - there should definitely be one, in both cases, but 8 games for 'pal' in Spanish, albeit an unfriendly one, or 'I didn't call you a black cnut', is too much, imho.

Ok I don't like either terry or Suarez. Both are modern day arrogant professional football players who I cannot relate to at all, however although both are being accused of “racism" the circumstances are very different.

Anton Ferdinand supposedly heard terry call him a "black c**t", terry then supposedly responded claiming " you can't seriously think I called you a black c**t", I don't know if anyone else on the pitch heard his original comments. I saw the YouTube video and to me it looks like at some point he says " blind c**t" but whether these were the original comments or the second set I don't know, this is not that unbelievable since it obviously stemmed from a footballing incident they disagreed on. The matter was raised to the police so it’s with them and depending on what the police find as the end result this should be what the FA chooses to do on the Racism charge. That’s really a no brainer. People are seeing this as a "get out clause" for the FA but it’s really not. The police are best placed to handle criminal matters which require evidence to successfully prosecute not the FA. The police cannot find him innocent and then the FA decide " well we charged Suarez we'll have him also", that will be farcical. But I actually don't put it past our FA as they are doing a good job destroying the English game in most other areas, this would be another indication of their incompetency.

Suarez has admitted and stated the word he used and its very messy, how can anyone prove that he didn't know the context of it in Europe? Might be genuine but might be lies to cover his back. I listened on the radio this morning they had people who study languages commenting and supporting his theory that the term is acceptable there, equally they had people saying its obvious to people with media in modern society what’s acceptable and what’s not.
I am indifferent to both charges as they are just both very cloudy, I think both charges should be handled by the police personally as they are best place to deal with something which is a criminal offence.
Some of you may laugh at this suggestion but both these cases clearly indicate how messy racism accusations get, it’s getting to the stage where players may need to start having something which records their speech at this rate, pitch side mics or personal light mics which attach to their shirts. I am not saying I support this. The VAST majority of players are well behaved but we've seen with these two incidents and the eruption of British society towards them that it might be a viable option to help with future incidents. Easily affordable but equally depressing it’s got to that.

[Mr Angry]

Agree with most of that Finerain, with one key exception; if the CPS say that there will be no criminal prosecution, that won't prevent the FA then charging Terry - it would just mean that the CPS don't believe that they have a good enough chance of getting a conviction for a criminal act.

The FA aren't under anything like the same levels of evidential requirement that the CPS are; if the CPS say they won't prosecute, the FA will inevitably charge Terry - they have only not done so up to now because of the possibility of criminal proceedings, and even if the CPS did say that they would prosecute, the FA would still have to wait to charge Terry until after the case had closed due to the laws of sub judice.

The FA WILL charge Terry - its just a question of when.

[Svlad Cjelli]

Agree with most of that Finerain, with one key exception; if the CPS say that there will be no criminal prosecution, that won't prevent the FA then charging Terry - it would just mean that the CPS don't believe that they have a good enough chance of getting a conviction for a criminal act.

The FA aren't under anything like the same levels of evidential requirement that the CPS are; if the CPS say they won't prosecute, the FA will inevitably charge Terry - they have only not done so up to now because of the possibility of criminal proceedings, and even if the CPS did say that they would prosecute, the FA would still have to wait to charge Terry until after the case had closed due to the laws of sub judice.

The FA WILL charge Terry - its just a question of when.

^^^^
Pre-empts almost exactly what I was about to post.

[cmonurz]

Agree with most of that except the Terry matter has been made an official police matter and suarez was strictly the FA right? So if the police find terry not guilty, then the FA by common sense would not need to take action and he would be cleared.

Presumably you would disagree with that, should it transpire.

A point that has already been made - if the context of what Suarez said is not important in relation to this charge, then nor should it be the context in which Terry said it. And as has also already been pointed out, the evidence required for the CPS to charge Terry will be more than that required for an FA charge similar to Suarez's (again, if we take your point that it is the utterance of the unacceptable words that is the issue).

Fwiw, for me, context is important to the severity of any punishment - there should definitely be one, in both cases, but 8 games for 'pal' in Spanish, albeit an unfriendly one, or 'I didn't call you a black cnut', is too much, imho.

Ok I don't like either terry or Suarez. Both are modern day arrogant professional football players who I cannot relate to at all, however although both are being accused of “racism" the circumstances are very different.

Anton Ferdinand supposedly heard terry call him a "black c**t", terry then supposedly responded claiming " you can't seriously think I called you a black c**t", I don't know if anyone else on the pitch heard his original comments. I saw the YouTube video and to me it looks like at some point he says " blind c**t" but whether these were the original comments or the second set I don't know, this is not that unbelievable since it obviously stemmed from a footballing incident they disagreed on. The matter was raised to the police so it’s with them and depending on what the police find as the end result this should be what the FA chooses to do on the Racism charge. That’s really a no brainer. People are seeing this as a "get out clause" for the FA but it’s really not. The police are best placed to handle criminal matters which require evidence to successfully prosecute not the FA. The police cannot find him innocent and then the FA decide " well we charged Suarez we'll have him also", that will be farcical. But I actually don't put it past our FA as they are doing a good job destroying the English game in most other areas, this would be another indication of their incompetency.

Suarez has admitted and stated the word he used and its very messy, how can anyone prove that he didn't know the context of it in Europe? Might be genuine but might be lies to cover his back. I listened on the radio this morning they had people who study languages commenting and supporting his theory that the term is acceptable there, equally they had people saying its obvious to people with media in modern society what’s acceptable and what’s not.
I am indifferent to both charges as they are just both very cloudy, I think both charges should be handled by the police personally as they are best place to deal with something which is a criminal offence.
Some of you may laugh at this suggestion but both these cases clearly indicate how messy racism accusations get, it’s getting to the stage where players may need to start having something which records their speech at this rate, pitch side mics or personal light mics which attach to their shirts. I am not saying I support this. The VAST majority of players are well behaved but we've seen with these two incidents and the eruption of British society towards them that it might be a viable option to help with future incidents. Easily affordable but equally depressing it’s got to that.

Thanks and good post, although (in terms of any action the FA takes) personally I'm struggling to get where the opinion that there may be more mitigation from in Terry's case comes from.

Suarez - Evra says he abused him, Suarez says it is a common reference used in his culture, there is no video evidence to backup it's nature.

Terry - on camera mouthing the words 'black cnut', we have like in the Suarez case only the word of two players to provide some context. Terry says he was responding to Ferdinand, Ferdinand denies the conversation took place.

A big grey area is both cases, which is why imho a charge of racial abuse is too strong - bringing the game into disrepute, with a two or three game ban plus (say) another five games suspended would do for both, imho.

[Svlad Cjelli]

AFAICS, the issue (and delays) in Terry's CPS case are all about whether there is sufficient evidence to prosecute, since it's denied/disputed what was said.

In the Suarez case, there doesn't seem to be dispute "what" was said so evidence is not as important. All that's disputed there is eat it meant.

[Scylla]

AFAICS, the issue (and delays) in Terry's CPS case are all about whether there is sufficient evidence to prosecute, since it's denied/disputed what was said.

In the Suarez case, there doesn't seem to be dispute "what" was said so evidence is not as important. All that's disputed there is eat it meant.

Everyone is speculating wildly 'til/if the reasoning is released but it would appear that the FA may have accepted Suarez's literal account of what he said (I'd really be surprised if the "10 times" was accepted) but not his argument as to what he meant by it - either because the panel didn't believe him or felt that the word in question was always unacceptable.

[Svlad Cjelli]

AFAICS, the issue (and delays) in Terry's CPS case are all about whether there is sufficient evidence to prosecute, since it's denied/disputed what was said.

In the Suarez case, there doesn't seem to be dispute "what" was said so evidence is not as important. All that's disputed there is eat it meant.

Everyone is speculating wildly 'til/if the reasoning is released but it would appear that the FA may have accepted Suarez's literal account of what he said (I'd really be surprised if the "10 times" was accepted) but not his argument as to what he meant by it - either because the panel didn't believe him or felt that the word in question was always unacceptable.

Although presumably if Suarez's argument was that he didn't think he was saying anything offensive, why would it matter how many times he said it? If anything saying it more would support his case.

[Scylla]

AFAICS, the issue (and delays) in Terry's CPS case are all about whether there is sufficient evidence to prosecute, since it's denied/disputed what was said.

In the Suarez case, there doesn't seem to be dispute "what" was said so evidence is not as important. All that's disputed there is eat it meant.

Everyone is speculating wildly 'til/if the reasoning is released but it would appear that the FA may have accepted Suarez's literal account of what he said (I'd really be surprised if the "10 times" was accepted) but not his argument as to what he meant by it - either because the panel didn't believe him or felt that the word in question was always unacceptable.

Although presumably if Suarez's argument was that he didn't think he was saying anything offensive, why would it matter how many times he said it? If anything saying it more would support his case.

It wouldn't.

[Svlad Cjelli]

Why not?

To me the argument "I didn't think there was anything wrong with saying it, look how many times I said it" is a much stronger one than "I didn't think there was anything wrong with saying it but I did only say it once."

[Scylla]

Why not?

To me the argument "I didn't think there was anything wrong with saying it, look how many times I said it" is a much stronger one than "I didn't think there was anything wrong with saying it but I did only say it once."

I hope he didn't word like that or he's lucky he only got 8 games.

[Extended-Phenotype]

More on this story; Suarez should win the appeal and this is nothing more than Evra making a mountain out of a molehill. The word Suarez apparently used, Nigerino, does not translate into ‘N***r’ as expected. It just means slave c*nt.

[Victor Meldrew]

Couldn't resist making a comment or two on this topic as I have been seething all day.
In the case of Terry as I understand it a member of the public made a complaint to the police and that is why a police investigation has taken place.
In the case of Suarez the investigation has taken place into words spoken by 2 players and because one of those players complained to the FA it has only been investigated by the FA as no member of the general public complained to the police.

The so-called racial abuse was made in Spanish by a half-caste South American to a black Frenchman on an English football pitch with nobody else in the ground hearing or understanding what was said.
The outcome of an incident between 2 people which could only be offensive if the recipient understood Spanish has led to an 8 game ban.
Earlier this year a current English international player stared scarily at a TV camera (that face really shouldn't be seen on TV particularly before the watershed time) and told many millions of viewers made up presumably of children as well as adults to "f... off"-the most offensive of Anglo-Saxon remarks.
So did this English player addressing millions of people get banned for a year?
Did he f***.
He just went on kicking players and eventually got a ban from EUFA (or was it FIFA ?).

What Suarez said to one person,the same person who had hacked him down and been booked for the offence,surely is less serious and offensive than a person abusing a whole nation?
Perhaps the FA is itself a racist organisation in dishing out heftier punishments to non-white,non-English players?

Obviously the FA wants to show the football world how seriously they take racist abuse-no argument with that other than with this case now not having been settled by a handshake as suggested by Gus Poyet (what a hammering he got for saying that)as should be the norm in sport where players clash in the heat of battle and nobody else is involved or affected ,what happens next?
Will we get players when their team is losing make up complaints to referees of abuse causing the refereees to possibly stop games?
Or "I only kicked him ref 'cos he racially abused me so you shouldn't send me off".
I think the FA decision is actually short-sighted-my solution would have been a suspended sentence with some obligatory language coaching-not Rooney language but more about acceptable use of the English language as well as a full explanation of the law in this country regarding racism.

We have come a very long way in kicking racism out of football on the terraces (and in the stands) where many people would have been offended but I do feel that this punishment is just way OTT for a one v one altercation on the pitch.
Unlike so many self-righteous commentators in The Press today I think this was a poor decision (my Liverpool bias put to one side as I like to think I would have the same view if it applied to Hernandez of Man Utd or to Luiz of Chelsea or any other South Americans )and creates a precedent that will be impossible to follow fairly.

[who are ya?]

Not reading that

[Svlad Cjelli]

Meanwhile, in France :

http://farenet.org/default.asp?intPageID=7&intArticleID=2679

French player given red card after claiming racial abuse by match official

Ligue de Football Professionnel (LFP) is investigating claims by Auxerre midfielder Kamel Chafni that linesman Johann Perruax had made a slur against him during his team's 1-0 defeat to Brest on Saturday......

[swansea jack]

Couldn't resist making a comment or two on this topic as I have been seething all day.
In the case of Terry as I understand it a member of the public made a complaint to the police and that is why a police investigation has taken place.
In the case of Suarez the investigation has taken place into words spoken by 2 players and because one of those players complained to the FA it has only been investigated by the FA as no member of the general public complained to the police.

The so-called racial abuse was made in Spanish by a half-caste South American to a black Frenchman on an English football pitch with nobody else in the ground hearing or understanding what was said.
The outcome of an incident between 2 people which could only be offensive if the recipient understood Spanish has led to an 8 game ban.
Earlier this year a current English international player stared scarily at a TV camera (that face really shouldn't be seen on TV particularly before the watershed time) and told many millions of viewers made up presumably of children as well as adults to "f... off"-the most offensive of Anglo-Saxon remarks.
So did this English player addressing millions of people get banned for a year?
Did he f***.
He just went on kicking players and eventually got a ban from EUFA (or was it FIFA ?).

What Suarez said to one person,the same person who had hacked him down and been booked for the offence,surely is less serious and offensive than a person abusing a whole nation?
Perhaps the FA is itself a racist organisation in dishing out heftier punishments to non-white,non-English players?

Obviously the FA wants to show the football world how seriously they take racist abuse-no argument with that other than with this case now not having been settled by a handshake as suggested by Gus Poyet (what a hammering he got for saying that)as should be the norm in sport where players clash in the heat of battle and nobody else is involved or affected ,what happens next?
Will we get players when their team is losing make up complaints to referees of abuse causing the refereees to possibly stop games?
Or "I only kicked him ref 'cos he racially abused me so you shouldn't send me off".
I think the FA decision is actually short-sighted-my solution would have been a suspended sentence with some obligatory language coaching-not Rooney language but more about acceptable use of the English language as well as a full explanation of the law in this country regarding racism.

We have come a very long way in kicking racism out of football on the terraces (and in the stands) where many people would have been offended but I do feel that this punishment is just way OTT for a one v one altercation on the pitch.
Unlike so many self-righteous commentators in The Press today I think this was a poor decision (my Liverpool bias put to one side as I like to think I would have the same view if it applied to Hernandez of Man Utd or to Luiz of Chelsea or any other South Americans )and creates a precedent that will be impossible to follow fairly.

So it's ok to be racist if the other person can't understand you?

Rooney should've had a longer ban but "F**k off" isn't the most offensive remark. Nonetheless, they really need to bridge the gap between park footy and the professional game on, at least, this front.

[rhroyal]

I do wonder what evidence they had to find Suarez guilty. Definitely agree with the punishment if he is guilty, it could even have been stronger in my view, but it appears to just be on Evra's word.

I assume the FA must know something more than we do to him guilty of this. It has also crossed my mind though, that handing out this punishment in a high profile case is a chance to put the middle finger up at Blatter and FIFA. We have a grudge against them now; it presented an opportunity to be smarmy and say "We take racism far more seriously than FIFA." Do I hold to that cynical view, or give them the benefit of the doubt?

[Hoop Blah]

I do wonder what evidence they had to find Suarez guilty. Definitely agree with the punishment if he is guilty, it could even have been stronger in my view, but it appears to just be on Evra's word.

I assume the FA must know something more than we do to him guilty of this. It has also crossed my mind though, that handing out this punishment in a high profile case is a chance to put the middle finger up at Blatter and FIFA. We have a grudge against them now; it presented an opportunity to be smarmy and say "We take racism far more seriously than FIFA." Do I hold to that cynical view, or give them the benefit of the doubt?

He originally admitted saying it. I'd say that's probably enough evidence.

The decision would've most likely been over the intent and confusion caused because of the language barrier which was what their original (public) defence was.