Well-known journalist Mykola Nesenyuk has spoken out about the "conditional" punishments of footballers who practice in Ukrainian football. As a reminder, Dynamo Kyiv defender Oleksandr Tymchyk has recently been banned for three matches, one of which was suspended.
Nikolay Nesenyuk- "You acted like predatory animals in the jungle, and you are lucky you didn't rape that poor girl, or I would have put you in jail for twelve years." The judge paused, looked at the pale Amerigo Bonasera from under his broad brows, then looked at the pile of investigation reports lying on his desk. Then he frowned and shrugged his shoulders, as if the sentence he was about to pronounce was not in line with his own wishes. He spoke again:
- "But, in view of your youth and the fact that you have not been brought to court before, and that you come from respectable families, and also because the law is not guided by a sense of revenge in its generosity, I sentence you to three years' imprisonment. Suspended.
It was only the professional habit he had acquired over forty years of wearing a look of grief on his face that kept Amerigo Bonasera from expressing his frustration and indignation. His beautiful and young daughter is still in hospital with her jaw broken and wired shut, and these creatures are to go free? This whole trial was a comedy from beginning to end...".
This passage from Mario Puzo's classic novel The Godfather came to mind when, after a long search through the depths of the Ukrainian Football Association's regulations, I finally came across this:
"Disciplinary sanctions may be applied conditionally. When applying a sanction conditionally, the Body takes into account the nature and degree of danger of the violation, the identity of the perpetrator and the circumstances of the case" (UAF Disciplinary Rules, part 6, paragraph 5).
The above quote, which I dug out from the depths of a document of more than a hundred pages, turns all these "disciplinary rules", together with the regulations of the Ukrainian Football Championship, into nothing! Because the "Authority" can take into account the "nature and degree of danger" and so on and cancel the punishment for any violation, making it "conditional".
Long digging through the FIFA and UEFA regulations, which would provide for a "conditional punishment" for a player, team, club or anyone else for violations, did not bring any results. Perhaps I wasn't looking hard enough and the experts will correct me. But I don't recall any players in the English, Spanish or German leagues, not to mention European club tournaments, being suspended from matches "conditionally".
If so, shouldn't the new UAF leadership carefully review its rules? "So that the decisions of the UAF Control and Disciplinary Committee do not look like a mafia novel, 'a comedy from start to finish'," Nesenyuk wrote on his Facebook page.
