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Ron Obvious

(6,261 posts)
5. This whole situation has been handled badly
Tue Feb 14, 2012, 08:26 PM
Feb 2012

Full Disclosure: Gooner here. No particular stake in the matter.

The stench of burnt sanctimony in the British press about this whole Suarez affair is overpowering. The press actually lap this sort of thing up but have to pretend be outraged and condemn Suarez, even to the point of tarring anyone with the racism brush who dares to defend the man.

If Suarez had been the sort of slick phony who was concerned about his image, he would have given Evra a big hug instead of a handshake. Imagine the reaction if he had done that! He would have been celebrated the world over, and even United fans might have cheered him every time he touched the ball after that. However, he clearly feels genuinely hard done by and, like Wayne Bridge, wasn't ready to let bygones be bygones. Regardless of what you think of the man, I'd rather see a genuine heartfelt snub than an insincere hug.

Personally, I think an 8 match ban was excessive. Seeing how potentially career-ending, bone or skull-crushing fouls and deliberate kicks to the head to prone players are punished with bans half as long as that or less, I find it damn hard to understand how what Suarez did was so much worse.

By all accounts, the man is not a racist but used a word ('Negrito') that's perfectly innocent in his own culture, but which was perceived as worse than it was intended. A simple 2 match ban would have sent a plenty strong message that it wasn't tolerated in England. There was no need to make him a sacrificial lamb.

The outrage over this whole incident is phony in my opinion, and absurd overreactions over trivialities like this do nothing to combat racism. Quite the reverse, I would think.

P.S. Small detail -- look closely at the (non-)handshake incident. I think Evra is lowering his hand just as Suarez comes by. It might well be that Suarez decided to skip him on the spur of the moment because of that.

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