By
joel bryan
Mr Evra asked mr suarez why he has kicked him referring to the foul 5 minutes earlier, they were talking in Spanish but mr Suarez replied “because you are black” mr evea says then to mr Suarez say “that to me again and I am going to punch you” mr Suarez then replied, “I don’t speak to blacks” mr Evra then continues to saying he then thought he was going to punch mr Suarez to which mr. Suarez replied, “ok, blackie, blackie, blackie” as mr.suarez said this he reached out towards mr.Evra’s arm gesturing towards his skin and it was at that point that dirk kuyt intervened.
The FA state they gained expert advic from Uruguay and other Latin american countries as to the use of the term negro, it is often used as a noun to address people wether family friends or passers by and is widely seen as inoffensive. It’s use can be seen as offensive, it depends on the context it is inoffensive when it is used with a sense of rap-pour or the attempt to create such rap-pour how ether if it were use with a sneer then it might carry negative connotations. Spanish experts told the FA if me.suarez said the things that he had allegedly said to mr.evra they should be deemed racially offensive in Uruguay and other regions of Latin America.
The report also goes onto say that mr. Evra was a credible witness, he gave his statement in a calm and clear way, it was FOR THE MOST PART consistent although he and Mr. Suarez were unable to remember every detail of the exchanges between them, by contrast the FA claim that Mr. Suarez’s evidence was unreliable in relation of matters of critical importance it was OF PART inconsistent with the contemporaneous evidence especially the video footage. Suarez said he pinched mr. Evra’s skin on his arm as an attempt to defuse the situation he also stated that his use of the word negro was considlatery an friendly, the FA say “we rejected that evidence, to describe his own behaviour that was unsustainable and simply extraordinary given that the players were engaged in an accumonios argument.
The decision to make the ban 8 matches was that if Suarez had have been sent off for abuse without referencing a players skin colour he would have received an automatic two match suspension, their FA guidance states that the starting point should be double that I,e four match suspension. However due to certain factors including the fact that mr.Suarez supposedly used the word negro towards Evra seven times which is conceived as an aggregating factor somehow Landing him on eight matches.
In conclusion the FA made clear that he did not act how he did because he is a racist as did me.evra.
That in short is the 115 page report in a nutshell, in my opinion some of the decisions and things said in this statement are questionable such as there is still no stone wall evidence hat Suarez even said this. I still back Suarez and will not have my mind changed simply because Evra Said so. I apologise If some of this makes no sense I wrote it really quick on my iPod and the spell corrector has a mind of its own.
Thank you and a happy new year.
NEGRO is not a racist word. The United States Census Bureau announced that “Negro” would be included on the 2010 United States Census alongside “Black” and “African-American” – does that mean the US government promotes and condones racism?
The trouble here is the judgement has been made by 3 individuals who probably have never experienced a second of true racism in their lives. They are a joke and disgrace to the United Kingdom.
THE FA OF ENGLAND IS THE RACIST PARTY HERE, NOT LUIS SUAREZ!
I sure hope Lfc make legal action as the clubs reputation in world football have been damage. thw thing i wonder is how they can not make action against Evra for saying DONT TOUCH ME SOUTH AMERICAN? Aswell as he got suspended for the thing he did against Fulham when no one else before been suspended for that! When comes the legal action for Terry? He called Ferdinand a BLACK CUNT! Bring the FA down now!
Sorry but you have just copied and pasted from the bullshit speculation in the short print that the fa have released does in no way mention Suarez calling Evra blackie 3 times. Fix up you poor excuse for a journalist
Is it possible that Luis Suarez, although he plays for Liverpool, may be an asshole? It’s not Liverpool’s fault. The evidence shows he’s been an asshole for years.
So is Evra. When two assholes irritate each other in the field when does the FA interfere?
So they say Evras evidence is reliable first he says he said nigger 10 times then five and the Fa think it’s 7 times. Says he doesn’t speak Spanish and thought negro meant nigger then admits to speaking Spanish to team mates and indeed insulting Suarez in Spanish. Why say he called me a nigger 10 times if he said negro ? And we haven’t even gone into past unproven allegations by the same witness. Liverpool or even Suarez should bring a case against the fa as they practically call Suarez a liar and that Evra was telling the truth. Also looking past the fact he insulted Suarez saying your sisters cunt, this is acceptable ? Or by saying get off me you south American is acceptable ? But call a black a black and whey hey throw the book at him
LFC should take this case to the high court. Enough is enough, the FA have no credibility what so ever, so who the f**k are they to hold investigations and charge a player based on the evidence put forward? Who are they to charge a player based on the accusations of a proven liar? Why isn’t Evra the subject of a smear campain as he admitted to verbally abusing Suarez?
LFC and Luis Suarez should sue the FA for damaging it’s/his global reputation.
This was planted by the fa and man utd to weak liverpoolfc, its’ injustice.
The language expert was not well versed in Uruguayan dialect, it was south american in general and Colombian mainly…
This is really difficult to read and understand…might want to work on your editing and proofreading mate.
uhmm, i actually didn’t copy and paste it from the FA.. haha and have you read the 115 page report? if you had you would know that is what is said in it.. its not a poor attempt at journalism it was a quick summ up for people who rightfully did not want to read 115 pages… grow up, calm down and conccentrate on the real matter at hand.
You guys completely missed ‘concha de tu hermana’ it seems the fa missed it too and got there translation wrong. If the experts viewed it they are not experts
Evra start a conversation in spanish with ‘your sister’s c**t’, yet the report goes out of its way to say that Suarez was guilty of trying to wind evra up and get him sent off.
If someone spoke to me about my sisters holiest of holies, I may punch them before ever describing their skin colour.
And every word Evra utters is totally reliable and the judgement od f the English F A is Impeccable – this is total BIAS
LFC should fight this – its got the F A look how clever we are written all over it – how can a barny between two people be so one sided – bloody crap
so were still none the wiser basically, there telling us wat were supposed to know weeks ago. its complete bullshit. notice how evra has been a good boy lately.
must be part the deal.piece of shite
The language and cultural experts two Brits from the University of Manchester? Are you taking the piss?
Balance of probabilities my fecking ARSEnal.
Am SLOWLY reading through full report. Up to page 37 now. So far it seems to be hearsay or Evra said this and Suarez said this.No clear witnesses. Kuyts statement not accepted.See page 33 ” we reject Mr. Kuyts evidence that Mr Evra said that the referee was only booking him because he was black” So Kuyt who was the nearest to the exchange has been rubbished!! So its only Evras word! Must keep reading to see what REAL evidence there is!
The language experts were from Manchester Uni. So they are not only biased but total frauds (how can you be an expert of a language non-native to you?)
I have now read through the entire 115 pages. My conclusions are as follows. Sore for the lenghty post. I also apologise in advance for any errors in spelling – I’m danish :-)
First to recap:
1) First of all there is still absolutely no “hard” evidence as to exactly what was said between the two players. No video-evidence, no witnes that actually heard the conversation. Nothing. Zippedi duda. Zero.
2) This all means that the decision against Luis is based primarily on reports and interviews given by Luis and Patrice and the committees view on those. Other players, staff and officials have been interviewed but none of them can contribute to clarifying what was actually said.
3) The language experts interviwed doesn’t really make any difference. All they say is that the terms used by Suarez can be seen as racist remarks but that they also are widely used in a number of ways that are not offensive. In other words – this doesn’t bring us closer to any conclusion.
4) The entire decision from the comittee is therefore more or less based on three persons view on the interviews given by Luis and Patrice and the hearing that took place.
5) They find Evra “an impressive witness” while Luis came across as unriliable. They post a few reasons for this of which Luis’ pinching of Evras arm and his explenation of this action is Suarez’ weakest point as he seems to have been inconsistent in his explenation regarding this. By the way – Evras former Chelsea case in which he appearantly was found unriable is not taken into account.
6) The bottom line remains: There is no actual evidence that supports Evras version of the events. Despite this Evras side of the story is accepted and Luis’ thrown in the bin.
7) Evras version is the used to determine the lenght of the penalty. The starting point is two days if the case regards abusive language. This is doubled if it’s racist. That makes it four days. This can be pulled up or down based on the circumstances. They end up on eight, primarily based on the number of times (according to Evra) that Suarez used the racist term. Luis family background, charity work and history with lots of black players is taken into account – but still: Eight days it is!
My personal guess:
It’s mostly a misunderstanding regarding the understanding of the word Negro/Negrito. I find Suarez version as reliable as Evras even though Suarez pinching of Evras arm doesn’t help his case.
However it shouldn’t matter what I “think”. Niether should it mather what a board of three people think. What should matter is evidence and the fact remains that none has been given. The case should end right there. How else is everything in society going to work? Who could imagine a robbery-case in a real trial end with the conclusion: We can’t really prove anything but you seem unriable. You’re going in the slammer?
LCF should definately take this further – the main argument been that no evidence has been given.
Suarez didn’t stand a chance when 2 of the supposed panel are manure supporters , 1 being a personal friend of Old Red Nose and the other being Roonies barrister. Independent my arse. I hope the old bastard has a heart attack and dies, hang on he hasn’t got a heart. LFC should sue the Manure, Evra and Fergie.
Nice! You want someone to die….how more deeply unpleasant can you be?
The entire conversation took place in Spanish and linguistic experts Professor Peter Wade and Dr James Scorer from Manchester who are in no way specialized in Uruguayan dialects but only in Colombians’ were present to “help” the 3 man-panel with the meaning of the phrases.
Two other freaks from the FA were in the secretariat for legal matters and “helped” the panel to come out with this shameful decision based on “balance of probability” instead of the classic proof “beyond the reasonable doubt” used in criminal courts. SOUNDS LIKE WEIRD AND TOTALLY BIASED ESPECIALLY WHEN WE KNOW THAT kUYT’S TESTIMONY WAS REJECTED UNFAIRLY on behalf of nothing but insanity.
Now let’s dig deeper and take a look at the three-man panel who gathered on Wednesday 21th Dec afternoon, the commission was chaired by Paul Goulding QC, who comes from the same Blackstones chambers as Adam Lewis, the barrister employed by the FA in Wayne Rooney’s successful Uefa appeal two weeks ago. Hummmmmm…
Goulding, is seen by those who have a political agenda against us as a qualified FA coach!!? And has seemingly advised Premier League clubs and players in the past.Hummm… Which ones please? If only people know…
Also involved as a second member of the panel, Brian Jones is the chairman of Sheffield and Hallamshire FA, who wrote to all his county members on June 20, stressing the need to fight discrimination. (Seems to me they worked hard to introduce to us the good guy, someone who is supposed to be above all contingencies?)But after a quick review, Brian Jones’ CV is reduced to a simple letter he wrote to his fellow county members and they want us to believe he’s an angel in white!?
Furthermore they want us to believe he’s qualified to deal with such a sensitive issue dealing with foreign culture and involving THE MIGHTY Liverpool, a club that has always took stance against racism.
The third member is Denis Smith, “well” respected within the game according to some people working the angle. Following his time as a defender at Stoke City and managing clubs such as Sunderland and Oxford United, it appears to me he’s the perfect manservant whose past as a player and manager can be put under scrutiny to outline his strong ties with people from the Elite (Oxford+Government) which are pushing for a political agenda in this sensitive issueas a counter attack against Hillsborough case.
Now I described the three man-panel, a legitimate question springs to mind, who picked them over other personalities more capable of dealing with big clubs and big issues and when did that happen? This is not an innocent question, knowing the process will speak volumes about the decision those people biased or not have made. Someone somewhere must address these questions…
At the end of the day this is not an independent regulatory commission as stated by the FA, if it were up to me an independent regulatory commission would’ve included two former big players from big clubs with one of them being black and the third member being a justice to moderate the debate with the due process of law without any freaks from the FA present at the meeting and trying to interfere with the debate (hearing sessions).
Yet after all this illegal proceedings I am stunned the legal department at LFC has done nothing about that. Worse they didn’t hire the best lawyer around. A good attorney would have said “Mr Suarez, if you make any indication that you used any language that could ever be considered racist, even if it’s Evra who started this mess in a first place you will be crucified.”
Instead, his lawyer let him say that he did use “negro” but not in the way Evra took it. The way it happened, it wasn’t Evra’s word against Luis’ (which would be very subjective), it was Luis’ meaning against Evra’s. The rules clearly state that meaning doesn’t matter.
And if some people are wondering why Evra hasn’t been punished evenly, they must refer to section 222 “the decision is limited to the Charge brought.”
There would have to be a separate charge brought against Evra, unfortunately I’m not sure whether Liverpool would have to file a complaint first. That’s why I say we need another bulldog lawyer to handle this case.
But what hurts me furthermore is the way the FA ended up considering Evra as a “credible witness” instead of a plaintiff. The la latter benefited from a complacent description as well. According to the little “fa” words he gave his evidence in a “calm, composed and clear way”.
Whereas on the contrary of that Suarez isn’t seen as a defendant but as only an unreliable witness?! It stinks…
According to the report, Evra admitted that he begun the exchange with Suarez by referring to the Uruguayan’s sister usqing harsh words in Spanish. But he just got away with it…
Suarez’s defence was that he had been called “South American” in a derogatory way by Evra. But the commission added: “We found that Mr Evra did not use the words ‘South American’ when speaking to Mr Suarez.” How do they know?
The initial ban according to the rules should’ve been two games that can be extended to four by any commission but 08 games? This is a ban from living in England not from playing the game. In their statement the FA were pretty clear about their intentions I quote” Suarez has damaged the image of English football around the world”. Wow, it sounds like a daylight plot to stop the sponsorship of Sports warriors set to take place next year. And down the process they’re forcing our hands to get rid of Suarez…
They’re wrong, we will give them a fearsome fight even if we have to storm the FA building, mark my words.
The legal representative for Luis Suarez agreed the panel to be fair….unless you think he is a part of the conspiracy too?
The legal representative you’re talking is Mr McCormick,and gues what? He was one of a two-man FA commission which ruled against Liverpool in deciding Manure had no legal obligation to sell Gabriel Heinze when the Argentine defender wanted to move to Anfield for £6.8 million.
Therefore a legitimate question springs to mind,who hired him and on behalf of what? Who is at the helm at Liverpool? How many other trojans are still there waiting to slaughter us at the first opportunity? All these questions must be addressed and sooner the better.
The way to make the panel’s decision “unappealable” is to base it on witness credibility and demeanor. These are matters which the appellate body will not have the opportunity to experience and see first hand as it would only be able to rely on documentary records of the proceedings below. If the evidence is unclear one way or the other, the best way to ensure a wrong decision does not get overturned is to say one side’s witnesses are unreliable. The QC on the panel obviously knew this and as such has engineered a situation where it would be difficult for Suarez to succeed on appeal.
One persons word is the basis of this punishment. If Suarez is the defendant, how can you dismiss his side of the story, especially when there is no other credible witnesses or evidence presented. The report is saying that Evra accused Suarez, and only Evra’s evidence of events is accepted because he said it in a clam orderly manner? That’s plain rubbish and a great travesty of Human Rights.
What a lod of rubbish by the England FA. It’s not that I love the FA less but I love Liverpool more. Me, Ashfah loves Liverpool.
I personally think Suarez shouldn’t have gotten himself into this pit of rubbish in the first place as a football player people look up to u as a role model and you have to conduct yourself in good manner.Yes he is our most prolific player yes he’s been the shinning star amongst all our recent signings but let’s be factual.Suarez shouldn’t have called Evra Negro repeatedly perharps 10,7 or 5 times.Suarez should even when Evra raised the matter denied it because of the consequences but he did admit and that wouldn’t help his cause,Suarez affirmatively said there isn’t no evidence he used offensive remarks on Evra even when the F.A said no one should make public statements till after the investigation I was gutted when I heard him said it and he said either of him or Evra might have to apologise to each other at the end of the day.These actions of his has not been helpful at all he should have obliged and kept mute.I really sympathise with him as he would be a tricky cause for him to exonerate himself and risk taking the appeal route as it might increase further his fine,damaging his reputation and widely tarnishing Liverpool FC image.
@ Brai: You say: Let’s be factual. This is exactly my point. Because is has in no way been proved that Suarez used the word 5-7 times. This is what Evra is claiming. Luis is saying he used the word once. Beyond that nothing has been proved as fact. So the facts are unclear. Yes – he shouldn’t have used the word at all but niether should he be punished for something he says he didn’t do when it hasn’t been proved as a fact.
I personaly think two days would have been fair. Four days is starting point in cases of racial abuse. This penalty can be higher or lower based on the specific events in each case. Regarding Suarez his background (Black grandfather, captain at Ajax, charity work and so on) plus the doubt about his intent when using the word should be to his benifit pushing the penalty down to eg two days. Instead the comittee use Evras claim which haven’t been proved to raise the penalty to eight days.
Buttom line remains that when FA handles your case you are not innocent until proven guilty. You are innovent until ASSUMED guilty if the three man comittee says so. This is downright scandalous and why LFC should take the case further. In a real courtroom it seems highly unlikely that you could be convicted with no “hard” evidence at all – just your opponents claim. It’s absurd, really.
I can understand why people feel this is either wrong or harsh. But it is time to move on – any appeal is likely to fail and will only distract the focus of the team and club. Four of the next eight games are likely to be cup ties so by starting the ban directly after the Man City game he will only miss four PL games and may come back refreshed and a little wiser for the last 15 games.
Amardeep Singh Mann says in number 8: “The language expert was not well versed in Uruguayan dialect, it was south american in general and Colombian mainly…”
I don’t know from where the language expert is (and I don’t know how you can be sure of that) but let me tell you something. In Colombia, as in every spanish speaking country, the words “Negro” and “negrito” are widely accepted with no racist connotations. It’s not about any dialect. It’s about spanish language.
I could call someone a bar steward, someone could misinterpret this as something different and insulting and report it to other people. Does this make the second persons’s claim about the statement any more correct or more valid? In no way should those hearsay statements from the MU dressing room been accepted, never mind as any indication of substantial proof.
The logic is garbage.
At the time of the disputed statements Evra did sincerely believe Suarez was racist, it was only when he realised that Suarez had not insulted him and there was proof to the alternative that he recanted that accusation. From that, if he now believes Suarez is not racist the original claim of insulting language can not be accepted as an insult only his misinterpretation. A none racist cannot by definition issue racist remarks.
Regarding motive: The previous case Chelsea case has significant bearing as Evra must have been warned about future conduct. Having raised the issue again he would have suffered significant penalties if he had not followed through. The commision had to discount Kuyt’s statement of ‘you only booked me cos I’m black’ as this did not fit their manufactured pattern and would have shown Evra to be a persistent accuser. In all his years as a footballer Suarez has never been accused of any act that is close to racism, indeed the opposite is true, yet the commission would have you believe on this one day, hour and minute he would alter his persona just to abuse this individual 5 times. A travesty.
The report condemns Liverpool players as liars and its officials as corrupt and its fans a racist but unfortunately we Liverpudlians are conversant with miscarriages of justice on a grand scale. Once some quango fabricates evidence and charges and incidences shown are twisted to mask the truth to reach a verdict they had prededicated it may be neccesary to accept the verdict if lawyers deem it impossible to go further. If that is the case in no way should we or Suarez make any apology. We accept the verdict without prejudice and maintain our stance and do not seek any reduction if it requires any admission of guilt.
Suarez should be advised that the next time he is abused by the crowd he smiles, waves and blows kisses as if they were supporters. In that way a strong message is given that he cannot be fazed or induced to react in a negative way.
Bellamy should be cautious over his judicious use of language as he is likely the next target by MU-FA.
Let’s hope that Luis will decide that he will stay at Liverpool but after this travesty I would not blame him if he went abroad. Yet again English justice has not been served and innocents sacrficed. This judgement has not helped the fight against racism, indeed it may have done exactly the opposite.
Suarez is only banned from 8 x 1st team matches. Liverpool should select him to play in the reserves and we should all support him. It will continue to give him match practice and give us a few extra points.