2014 FIFA World Cup

[Lineker]

Recife today.

Suarez thing could probably do with its own thread now, especially with the USA game coming up shortly, no?

[King Ellis]

Oh, so you want to make one dedicated topic to spreading your lies about him? You're the witch hunter general you are, Liniker.

[Gazz]

It's because Suarez isn't one of his tribe.

[MJB]

Any excuse to start another thread

[stokeriño]

The General Football Thread would do, I'd say.

[Nerf]

I should start every opinion I voice with the prefix "keep in mind, Danny Mills is the biggest idiot alive, so on the basis that what I'm about to say isn't something he has also said, naturally it will be completely irrefutable".

Not too dissimilar from you defending John Terry a few years ago, no?

[Benjamin]

I should start every opinion I voice with the prefix "keep in mind, Danny Mills is the biggest idiot alive, so on the basis that what I'm about to say isn't something he has also said, naturally it will be completely irrefutable".

Not too dissimilar from you defending John Terry a few years ago, no?

So what you're saying is, the dumb thing stoker (apparently, I don't know that he did, I'm just going off what you're saying here) did, is same dumb thing you're calling "the most balance thoughts I've seen on the Suarez situation"?

[Lineker]

I haven't started the thread though, someone else is more than welcome to :/

FIFA presser is just about to start.

[Lineker]

Suarez suspended for nine matches and banned from all football for four months.

[Asuka's Gonna Kill You]

Yeah, absolute joke really. Nine matches too, laughable.

Edited June 26, 2014 by JohnnyPerfect

[Benjamin]

What does "banned from all football" mean? What, he can't play FIFA for 4 months?

[Lineker]

Also fined £65k.

What does "banned from all football" mean? What, he can't play FIFA for 4 months?

Not sure, this woman isn't very clear, she said both things :/

[King Ellis]

Is that active as of now, barring any appeal?

So, wouldn't be back for Liverpool, if he were to stay, till like late October? Maybe that extra month off this time will be enough to propel them to 1st!

[Lineker]

All football activity, they're now saying.

[Gazz]

So he can't even train?

SuperPorky Suarez!

[Arjen Robben]

[stokeriño]

Sounds to me like his nine matches ban is for Uruguay (so will last into next year I guess) and he will also be banned from playing for Liverpool (or anyone else) until about November. And yes, FIFA can do that.

Guess what! Chelsea play Liverpool just a week or two after he's allowed to play again. Yaaaaaaay. >_>

[Lineker]

Bring on the Nerf meltdown!

[King Ellis]

"Hello, FIFA? Yes, I was just out walking my dog when I walked past my neighbours house and saw Luis Suarez watching Match of the Day."

[METALMAN]

Probably the most balanced thoughts I've seen on the Suarez incident so far, from the Tomkins Times:

Luis Suarez bit someone, which is wrong. It’s not nice to see. But he didn’t maim them, or rape them, or kill them. No-one was seriously hurt, or was ever going to get seriously hurt. You shouldn’t bite someone on a football pitch. But one football pundit – Danny Mills – said that Suarez deserves locking up for life. Even the sickest criminals rarely get such a sentence. Had he still been alive, even Jimmy Saville wouldn’t have got a life sentence, and he raped little girls and allegedly had sex with corpses.

People find biting disgusting, and maybe it is; but once we start getting onto the subject of ‘disgusting’ then everyone is different. I find eating insects disgusting, but in some countries it’s a staple. I don’t find eating parts of a cow disgusting, people from other cultures (and vegetarians) do. And yet in Britain we’re not disgusted by a deliberately-swung elbow to break nose, jaw or cheek.

Biting is a primal instinct, something children do and then usually grow out of. And yet so too is forming a gang – a witch hunt, if you will, dating back well before the existence of witches – to drive the outsider out of town.

Someone noted in the comments section of TTT that if John Terry had done this we’d be up in arms. And he was right – we probably would; because John Terry is only not part of our tribe, he’s seen (as captain of a rival club) as a threat to it. We’d have got it all out of perspective, because what’s better than John Terry getting a two-year ban for some low-key violence? We’d have been high on the scent of blood, readying our pitchforks and sharpening our sense of moral outrage.

Here’s a thought. Ex-Premier League striker Marlon King gets an easier time in England than Luis Suarez. He’s not as famous, obviously, but he doesn’t elicit the same tribal responses because he’s English, and doesn’t play for such a high profile club. He’s certainly not a threat to Premier League sides, or the English national team; he’s merely a threat to the general public.

King is now back in jail, serving another 18-month term, but was still playing in the Championship last season. Coventry, Birmingham and Sheffield United all employed him despite his record as a woman-beater, police-assaulter and sexual offender. Then there’s Lee Hughes, who killed someone with dangerous driving, and later played for a number of professional clubs. And yet I expect a fair few fans of all those clubs are amongst the millions up in arms as Suarez’s bite.

Plenty of footballers have (allegedly) been involved in gang-rapes, assaults, match-fixing (that defrauds thousands of paying customers and thousands of betting punters), and other far more serious incidents. They may not happen on the pitch, but they still get to play football without mass hysteria following them around. Suarez is part of the “dirty foreigner” tribe, and a target for anyone in the upright, moral English tribe.

Ever heard of confirmation bias?