The Spit Seen Round the World

Jonny Evans has been banned for six games for his spitting incident with Papiss Cisse in the match against Newcastle.

The fact that we're discussing an altercation between two players because of spitting is really indicative of how sensitive we are to these kinds of incidents. This "Spit Seen Round the World" has prompted arguments about how the penalty for spitting should compare to the penalty for racist acts or career-threatening tackles.

Right now, I'm watching the pre-match coverage on NBC Sports and they're discussing the incident. Their opinions are, from my understanding, that they would rather have suffered a career ending injury from a tackle than be spat on, because of how demeaning it is to be spat at.

You're kidding me. If I were to ask any player currently in the EPL, no in any league in any country, that player would tell me he'd rather be spat on than to give up his playing career. Being spat on is definitely not the most degrading thing that can happen to you. By saying that, you're completely undermining everything that has happened with regard to racism in football recently. You're essentially saying that Gervinho, who had an inflatable banana thrown at him during a match, should just buck up and get over it. Instead, we should be more appalled that Cisse and Evans spit at each other.

I apologize, but I can't listen to all this talk about spitting being so horrible and just sit here idly. Spitting is gross, we can all agree on that. There's no place for it in the game; kids watching around the world should not see players behaving like that. But kids also shouldn't see players being mocked because of race, or players being the victims of ridiculous challenges that not only threaten their career but also their livelihood.

If the FA wanted to make an impact with the match bans for these two players, they've certainly accomplished that, but not in the manner they would have hoped. People aren't delighted that the FA has effectively said they won't stand for spitting, they're enraged that the FA has effectively said that they will stand for racism.