Football.London have now revealed the details of Dele Alli’s hearing that led to the Tottenham Hotspur midfielder being banned for one competitive game.
Alli uploaded a video on his personal Snapchat back in February in which he seemed to mock a man of Asian origin over the spread of COVID-19 (Daily Star).
Following an Independent Regulatory Hearing, it was confirmed on Thursday that the midfielder has been suspended for one competitive match, as well as being fined £50,000.
According to the commission’s report, the Spurs midfielder pleaded that the video was not racially motivated and that he only filmed the person of Asian origin since he was coughing.
The fact that he including the words: “Corona whattttt, please listen with volume”, in the video, was cited as evidence of the fact that he was referring to the cough, even though the man was not heard to be coughing in the video.
Additionally, it was revealed that the midfielder uploaded the video on his personal Snapchat which was accessible to around 160 people who he regarded as ‘friends and colleagues’.
Even though the 24-year-old swiftly deleted the video, it was reportedly copied by one of the (unidentified) Snapchat recipients and forwarded to a national newspaper, who in turn published the material online.
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The court accepted Alli’s explanation on the coughing and acknowledged that they were not alleging he was a racist.
However, they still ruled that the video included an implied reference to race and nationality and “was open to the interpretation that the creator was seeking to observe that there was a link as between the man of Asian appearance and coronavirus.”
They thus decided to hand the England international a one-match ban instead of a six-game suspension.
Spurs Web Opinion
It is very clear from Dele’s explanation that the video was not racially motivated. However, it was still silly of him to upload a video such as this on social media. Hopefully, he will have learned a lesson.
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