Evans' Ban For Spitting At Newcastle's Papiss Cisse 'Troubling'

The Sunday Supplement panel believe Manchester United's Jonny Evans was unlucky to receive a six-game ban for spitting at Newcastle's Papiss Cisse.

Evans denied he had deliberately spat at Cisse when the two teams met in the Premier League at St James' Park on Wednesday night.

"I would like to make it clear that I did not spit at Papiss Cisse," Evans said in a statement the following day. "Having woken up this morning, I am shocked to have seen the media coverage from last night's match."

The FA disagreed, though, and found Evans guilty, meaning the Northern Ireland international will now miss key matches against Arsenal, Tottenham, Liverpool, Aston Villa, Manchester City and Chelsea.

However, football writer Patrick Barclay feels Evans has been harshly treated by the game’s governing body.

"I just cannot be sure, having watched the incident, that he's not telling the truth when he says that he spat, but that he didn't spit deliberately in the direction of Papiss Cisse," he said.

"I'm not saying yes or no. All I'm saying is that I'm very troubled by it and have been ever since it happened. I've watched it and cannot see there's a man guilty of a six-match offence."

And the Daily Mail's Chief Sports Writer Martin Samuels agrees with the view that Evans is unfortunate to have been found guilty.

"Jonny Evans is banned for six matches because The FA doesn't have that wonderful burden of proof thing that everyone thought was so magnificent," he said.

"When it was the John Terry and Rio Ferdinand case, everyone was rejoicing that they don't have burden of proof, but this is what happens when you don't have burden of proof. He says: 'I didn't spit at the guy' and we can't prove that he did spit at the guy, but we just go we are going to ban you anyway.

"If you have a very low burden of proof, you are always going to get situations like this when you're looking at it thinking 'I'm not sure'."

Credit: Skysports.com