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What Luis Suarez did when he bit Branislav Ivanovic was unacceptable. No one is disputing that.

As far as I am aware, no one at Liverpool Football Club is running away from their responsibilities over that.

The club has said that he was wrong. Luis, himself, has admitted that he was wrong, and they were both right and wise to accept the punishment yesterday.

The issue is clearly in the length of the player’s ban and the fact that the FA’s disciplinary system is a horrible mess.

Let’s start with the fact that the FA said before they had appointed the so-called ‘independent’ regulatory commission that Suarez deserved more than the normal three-game ban.

Well, by saying that, they prejudiced the findings of the commission before it has even begun.

They appointed the people to sit on it and they have told them they are there to give him more than three games.

So those three people know they have to give the player more than three games just to justify their existence.

(Image: Andy Stenning / Daily Mirror)

How ‘independent’ does that make the three-man commission?

I wish the FA would just stop playing with words. Because this panel wasn’t truly independent and to say it was is blatantly misleading.

The FA chooses who sits on it to begin with. Does that make it ‘independent’?

And who sits on it? An ex-player, an FA council member and a lawyer already known to the FA.

So there’s an FA council member on an ‘independent’ FA commission. That’s convenient.

And there’s an ex-player, who would probably like to do more work for the FA. That’s convenient, too.

Are they paid, by the way? Are they paid by the FA? Do they do it for free? I don’t know the answer to those questions but

I’d like to know.

The point is that the structure of an FA disciplinary procedure like this is inherently unfair.

If you commit a crime in this country, you get the right for your case to be heard by a jury that has no affiliation or responsibility to the people prosecuting you.

(Image: LuisSuarez.co.uk)

That’s not how the FA works it. In fact, their disciplinary system has now become so confused and riddled with anomalies that it is farcical.

They hide behind excuses about the referee saw it or didn’t see it, punished it or didn’t punish it.

So Jermain Defoe bites Javier Mascherano on the arm and gets a yellow card. Nothing more.

Suarez bites Ivanovic and gets 10 games. Why? Because the referee didn’t see it.

He still spoke to him about something and looked like he was warning him but he didn’t see it.

For the benefit of football in this country, there has got to be greater clarification of the rules and more balance in the way offenders are judged.

The most important thing is not the length of the sentence but how they reach it and that information needs to be made public at the time the punishment is announced. That would have alleviated much of the unnecessary discussion about the ban handed down to Suarez.

The FA has been in need of widespread reform for a long time. The need is getting more and more pressing.

These regulatory commissions have to be independent in more than just name.

Now read Bonus Kenny Dalglish: Beware the Bundesliga.. and champions Manchester United playing with freedom.