RIO DE JANEIRO: Uruguay’s Luis Suarez’s World Cup dream was left in tatters when he was handed a record nine-match ban on Thursday by FIFA for biting an Italy defender during a group match.
Suarez was also suspended from any football-related activity for four months and fined 100,000 Swiss francs (Rs 67.36 lakh), football’s world governing body said in a statement.
“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,” Claudio Sulser, chairman of the FIFA Disciplinary Committee, said in a statement.
Suarez will miss Uruguay’s last-16 match against Colombia here on Saturday and will play no further part in the tournament in Brazil if they progress.
He missed the first match of the tournament due to injury but returned to score twice in Uruguay’s 2-1 win over England.
Suarez will not be able to train or attend matches with his club Liverpool until late October, meaning he will miss at least nine EPL games and the start of their Champions League campaign.
“Liverpool Football Club will wait until we have seen and had time to review the FIFA Disciplinary Committee report before making any further comment,” Liverpool CEO Ian Ayre said on the club’s website.
Suarez can appeal against the ban, the longest FIFA has imposed for an offence at a World Cup, but it would remain in place while any appeal was heard, said a FIFA spokeswoman.
The previous record ban was eight games on Italy’s Mauro Tassotti for breaking the nose of Spain’s Luis Enrique in 1994.
Suarez has now been involved in three incidents of biting opponents.
He was also banned for one match at the last World Cup in South Africa for a deliberate handball that cost Ghana a match-winning goal in a quarterfinal.
The latest biting incident occurred 10 minutes from the end of their final Group D match shortly before Diego Godin scored to give the South American champions a 1-0 win to seal Uruguay’s progression and Italy’s elimination from the tournament.
Suarez clashed with Giorgio Chiellini who furiously pulled open his shirt to show the mark to the referee, Mexican Marco Rodriquez, who took no action.
Photographs show what FIFA’s Disciplinary Committee accepted were bite marks on Chiellini’s shoulder and pictures also showed Suarez sitting on the ground holding his teeth immediately after the incident.
Suarez served a 10-match ban last year after biting Chelsea’s Branislav Ivanovic in a Premier League match and in 2010 he was suspended for seven games for biting PSV Eindhoven’s Otman Bakkal while playing for Ajax Amsterdam.
The other major controversy of his career came in 2011 when he was alleged to have racially abused Manchester United’s French defender Patrice Evra during a Premier League match.
He was banned for eight matches and fined for that and was then handed a further one-match ban for making a gesture at Fulham fans. (Reuters)