QuoteCame across this on Balls.ie:
Originally Posted by Balls.ie
Now you've just Tempted Fate! For 2026...
Came across this on Balls.ie:
That was agony to watch.
Yeah, too OTT.
I don't think CAS have published the full judgment of the Suarez case yet, but I've just had a read of their official press release on the decision, which features a neat summary of their conclusions: http://www.tas-cas.org/d2wfiles/docu...1420082014.pdf
The FIFA Disciplinary Committee's decision was originally outlined here and the FIFA Disciplinary Code upon which that decision was based can be found here.
CAS considered the sanctions in line with the following articles, as specified above:
Interestingly, part (e) of article 48.1 outlines that a ban of "at least six matches [would be considered appropriate] for spitting at an opponent or a person other than a match official". Spitting (along with biting) is admittedly disgusting/socially frowned-upon, insulting and terribly unsporting, but worse than a physically-damaging assault that might seriously threaten the health, well-being or career of another player? I'm not so sure about that.
Article 19 details the nature of potential suspensions rather than specifically mentioning what sort of length might be appropriate for different types of offences. It does state, however, that any suspension "may not exceed twenty-four matches or twenty-four months". That raises the question: what sort of utterly awful misconduct might a player have to commit to be penalised with such a lengthy suspension? If the lower threshold of a ban for an assault is at least two games, I can't imagine that conduct warranting a two-year ban would be the type of conduct that would legally enable a player to return back on to a field of play after two years under the common law anyway!
Anyway, back on point; the Suarez case appears to be somewhat different in nature to, say, the Daniel Kearns case or any potential case that Legia Waraw might bring to CAS against UEFA over their enforced 3-0 forfeit loss to Celtic as the disciplinary regulations in question are more subjective, ambiguous or open-ended than the more objective and literally-interpreted regulations that were or would be under analysis in the former two examples.
In Kearns' case, the question was: have FIFA applied the regulations correctly? It was a simple yes-or-no answer. And they were found to have been applying them correctly.
In the Suarez case, though, it's been: have FIFA applied an appropriate or proportionate punishment based on the nature of the offence and the applicable regulations in place governing such conduct? The answer is not simply a straight yes-or-no one; CAS must also consider exactly what amounts to an appropriate punishment.
How exactly do CAS decide on a more subjective and undefined matter like this? It seems that the concept of what might be fair and what might be unfair may well come into certain CAS cases of this nature then. Do FIFA have some further set of disciplinary guidelines to which their Disciplinary Committee adhere and from which CAS can also take cue or do CAS simply base judgment on their own perspective of what is just (or considered appropriate and proportionate)? It will be interesting to read the full judgment once it's published.
Purely in light of article 48.1 (d), I do think Suarez can feel hard done-by. In my opinion, CAS could have lightened the severity of the punishment even further than they did. When FIFA stated in their original explanation of the decision that "such behaviour cannot be tolerated on any football pitch, and in particular not at a FIFA World Cup when the eyes of millions of people are on the stars on the field", they were, more-or-less, admitting that they were making an example of a prominent scapegoat. The witnessing audience and resulting publicity may have been bloated due to the stage upon which the incident occurred, but did it really magnify the crime? Article 39.4 permits the Disciplinary Committee to "take account of all relevant factors in the case and the degree of the offender's guilt when imposing the sanction"; this would seemingly allow a determination on an appropriate punishment to be made on the basis of the status or prominence of the game in which an incident of misconduct occurred. Article 40 also accords the panel the right to "increase the sanction to be pronounced as deemed appropriate if an infringement has been repeated"; of course, Suarez was indeed a recidivist. However, it's often a universally-recognised principle of sport that all misconduct on a field of play is to be treated equally, be it in a World Cup final or at national lower-league level. I think it's overly prejudicial to allow the prominence of the setting colour so significantly the severity of the punishment.
Another thing; does CAS's opinion that "the stadium ban and the ban from 'any football-related activity' were excessive given that such measures are not appropriate to sanction the offence committed by the player and would still have an impact on his activity after the end of the suspension" mean that part (f) of article 11 might be deemed inherently unjust no matter what the crime might be? I should think a suspension from any football-related activity would always have the effect of impacting upon a suspended footballer's activity after the end of the suspension period, wouldn't it?
Last edited by DannyInvincible; 17/08/2014 at 2:46 PM.
I was just having a read of some other CAS cases and came across the following paragraph in a case brought against UEFA by Fenerbahçe last year:
It seems to offer the best clarification I've been able to find relating to the court's competence or ability to consider the proportionality of disciplinary punishments. CAS upheld UEFA's verdict.
Actually, this paragraph from another case offers a better clarification of the competence of CAS on matters where a disciplinary body whose decision is under review enjoys an extra discretion under its rules to set an ambiguously-defined sanction (and, I think, on matters where no discretion at all is afforded by the rule-book):
I suppose the above is something I'd suspected or assumed to be true based on how I see arbitration bodies like CAS operate, but I don't think I'd ever seen their scope or competence clarified explicitly. I interpret the above to at least implicitly confirm that CAS cannot then make judgments based on external notions of "fairness" and "proportionality" on matters where the rules concerned or under review do not permit a disciplinary body any extra discretionary power. For example, in the case of Legia Warsaw who were punished with a 3-0 loss against Celtic; due to the fact there is no discretionary power accorded to UEFA in the rule-book in relation to the offence Legia committed - the relevant regulation clearly states that punishment for fielding a suspended player is the match being declared forfeit - CAS have no scope to overturn or review the proportionality of the punishment. Even when there is discretionary power accorded by the relevant regulations, CAS will only review the sanction under very limited circumstances.
(I do realise I'm posting back and forth to myself here by this point, but I'm sure someone's interested somwehere. Anyone?... No? OK...)
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