I certainly agree that there is no room in our game for racism. Racism still exists and racist chants can be heard in European games in the former eastern bloc, but it has been cleaned up to a great degree in our own league and to a lesser extent in the Scottish league, despite the sectarian chants that still exist between the Old Firm rivals.
But instead of this being a politically correct statement targeted at those namesakes who have been named recently, I would like to concentrate on the accuser. In this recent case it involved Patrice Evra being “called the same word ten times” by Luis Suarez. Now nobody, even Liverpool fans can paint a positive picture of the great Uruguayan in regards to his record on the pitch. The fact is the young man has previous, whether it be biting a players shoulder in the Dutch league, being accused of assimilation and knocking Ghana out of the World Cup with his spectacular diving handball.
Let’s however concentrate on the facts pertaining to this case, especially concentrating on Patrice Evra. He stated to Canal, the French Press station, in particular to a journalist some twenty minutes after the match “he used the same word ten times”. If such was the case, why didn’t Patrice Evra immediately report this to the referee to be made of and to write down in his match report? This would have saved the Football Association a lot of time, who could have immediately acted accordingly.
Dithering has only created more room for doubt. When talking about Luis Suarez having previous, one can hardly call Patrice Evra a beacon of light. Even during the match he was seen as trying to badger the Liverpool fans with scenes of him kissing his badge. There was the incident involving him trying to get Stewart Downing carded as well which would of hardly endeared him to anyone either. Evra has used the race card before, once accusing a Chelsea steward of calling him the “n” word after he was politely told to leave the pitch so the grounds men could get on with mending the wear tear on the pitch. All of it led to nothing but highlighting Patrice Evra being a whinging little madam.
One needn’t look further than the last World Cup where again he was involved in drama, revolving around the manager. His part in the escapade resulted in him being banned from participating in French internationals for five games. But I digress from the main topic at hand. Over whether or not Suarez did indeed result to using gutter language to wind Evra up. If he did, Luis will be rightfully penalised and punished. However if this does not end up being the case I feel Evra should be made an example of for dragging and besmirching the name of a fellow player.
The investigation by the Football Association will find evidence as there are cameras all around the ground. Unless Suarez covered his mouth whilst saying it, the use of lip readers will certainly unearth the truth. Either way I hope the matter is resolved quickly for the sake of the Premier League and relations between the two clubs.
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I think you have to be careful of accusing Evra of having a history of playing the race card without getting the facts right. I also think Suarez is trashing himself with his behaviour (in the Netherlands, a “Suarez” is a dive). If he did indeed use racist terms (we may never know), it is disappointing as Uruguay was one of the first South American nations to include black players in its national team.
You should look at this blog for a balanced debate on the incident:
http://bit.ly/pV84lO
race card is often flashed in contentious issuesb without factual backing. we cant be sure but am certain that Suarez is not the type who go about those bigoted business.Evra has had a few fallout with Fabregas and things almost went out of hand. Someone has to tell him to chill out. I know Man Utd players are told to take it as a war but Evra takes it too far.