John Terry retires from international football

His reason is he feels the FA's obsession with dropping charges in him has made the role untenable. Honestly, the other things he's done aside, he has a point here. He was found innocent of racist abuse in a national court of law - what right to do the FA have to try and tell the UK court system they are wrong and call him a racist anyway? And if they side step this and say they're actually charging him for his use of language in the game generally, why is Anton not also facing charges? It's ridiculous.

I should clarify, this is not me saying John Terry is a patron saint and should be knighted. This is me purely saying the court found him innocent and we have to accept that.

He should stand before the FA.

A judicial court = can convict on evidence

The FA = can convict on a balance of probabilities (i.e. Suarez case)

Therefore, to be fair, he should face an FA hearing just like Suarez.

If it doesn't, it will just drag open the Suarez case with people asking for that to be taken to the courts to clear Suarez's name.

The court found him innocent because it wasn't possible to prove his guilt beyond all reasonable doubt. The FA charge only has to be proved on the balance of probability - which isn't the same as saying the court got it wrong. Sometimes when cases don't go to the criminal courts, they get taken to the civil courts instead because they require a lesser standard of proof to succeed.

It rather looks as if Terry thinks he's going to lose this one and is jumping before he's pushed.

Look at it this way - you get accused of racial abuse in work, a criminal conviction is placed upon you but you are found innocent in a court of law. So you return to work, only to be ushered into your managers office and told 'well, you probably did it though, didn't you? So we're sacking you'.

You wouldn't be ticked off and immediately challenge with unfair dismissal?

Except your manager (or mine) probably wouldn't put it like that, but would couch it in terms of bringing the company's reputation into disrepute. I'm not saying it's fair, certainly I would be ticked off, but while not being an expert in employment law I expect my manager (or yours) would have already taken legal advice before laying himself open to a charge of unfair dismissal.

Im not saying he didnt do it because only JT know thats but if the court said he's innocent then he is , unless some new evidence comes forward.

The FA have no right to make up there own minds about it.

thewelshfella wrote:Im not saying he didnt do it because only JT know thats but if the court said he's innocent then he is , unless some new evidence comes forward.

The FA have no right to make up there own minds about it.

Well if they have no right, I'm sure JT will be counter-sueing, won't he?

thewelshfella wrote:Im not saying he didnt do it because only JT know thats but if the court said he's innocent then he is , unless some new evidence comes forward.

The FA have no right to make up there own minds about it.

The FA have every right; or they wouldn't be doing it. (See above)

The Tonker wrote:

thewelshfella wrote:Im not saying he didnt do it because only JT know thats but if the court said he's innocent then he is , unless some new evidence comes forward.
The FA have no right to make up there own minds about it.

Well if they have no right, I'm sure JT will be counter-sueing, won't he?

That true, he would sue.

I guess what I was trying to say was If someone is found innocent in a court of law then unless new evidence comes forward they should be treated as innocent.

Obviously, I'm with welshfella on this one. This balance stuff is nonsense, we can't go about punishing people because they 'probably' did something. Innocent is innocent, and guilty is guilty.

Red614 wrote:Obviously, I'm with welshfella on this one. This balance stuff is nonsense, we can't go about punishing people because they 'probably' did something. Innocent is innocent, and guilty is guilty.

We can and we do. Civil courts require a lower threshold of proof than criminal courts, and so 'probably' becomes good enough.

Sorry Tonker I havent got a great knowledge of the legal system.

If JT went to Civil court and was found guilty there instead what would happen then?

thewelshfella wrote:Sorry Tonker I havent got a great knowledge of the legal system.

If JT went to Civil court and was found guilty there instead what would happen then?

I too don't have a great knowledge of the legal system. I daresay punishments wouldn't be as severe - maybe a fine? Community service? Clean Anton's boots for a month?

My guess was that the punishment would be less.

Just read CB39 post and seen they did this in the Suarez case so I guess this is just there standard procedure and they havent just singled JT out.

Still feels abit unfair to get trialled twice for the same crime even though there is no new evidence,but I guess thats just me.

My understanding is tht the balance of probabilities as burden of proof means that the findings of the ruling are more likely than not. In reality the probity of the burden is proof is equally robust to beyond reasonable doubt burden of proof. The difference is that there isn't sufficient evidence to prove an allegation to absolutely convince a jury where there is a contrary (and plausible... no matter how unlikely) series of events that could explain the allegation. I hate to say this but as a lay person it sometimes feels that guilty individuals are released due to technicalities under the beyond reasonable doubt burden of proof. In reality all decisions are subjectives and a certain percentage will be incorrect.

In my opinion (purely subjective but on the evidence I've seen) the man used language in a pejorative racist manner.... Guilty as charged