Everyone who had watched the FIFA World Cup 2014 that was recently held in Brazil would have seen or at least known about the biting incident that took place in the group match between Uruguay and Italy. Luis Suarez, the famed forward striker of the Uruguayan national team, had bit Italian defender Giorgio Chiellini with his front teeth in the Italian penalty box when they were both running to get the ball.
Giorgio immediately showed the bite marks on his shoulder to the match referee who did not spot this incident. There was clear video evidence of the biting incident and of course the marks of Suarez’s dreaded front teeth on Giorgio’s shoulders also were clearly visible in the video. This resulted in the FIFA’s disciplinary committee to banning the Uruguayan footballer from active football over a period of four months.
This meant that Luis Suarez was not allowed to play in any of the future matches that Uruguay played in the World Cup in Brazil and his punishment would carry over for his club matches.
Suarez has been in the limelight for wrong reasons, especially for the biting incident, for three times now. Despite his poor game ethics on the football field, Barcelona has gone ahead and bought him from the Premier League for the Spanish football season of 2014. Suarez will not be able to play the initial games for Barcelona due to his football ban and would have to sit out for many group games.
It is not just the football ban, but Suarez has also had to forgo a lot of his endorsement money after this biting incident. The worst endorsement cancellation was the cancellation of the sponsorship deal of 888poker who took him in their clan as a brand ambassador just before the World Cup in Brazil.
888poker, which has its headquarters in Australia, signed Luis Suarez as the brand ambassador of their online poker website owing to the fantastic season that he had at Anfield where he had scored 31 goals. He was also praised for his immense contributions to the game of football. But, one single bite incident turned his world upside down in a mater of a few minutes. 888poker immediately announced the cancellation of the sponsorship deal with the footballer soon after his 4 month ban.
He had only signed on the dotted lines to be the brand ambassador of 888poker in the month of May 2014. Barely after a month 888 poker cancelled the sponsorship deal with immediate effect after the biting incident. The endorsement is said to be over 100 million dollars and it was a key sponsorship deal in the footballer’s life.
Luis Suarez has let go one of the biggest off pitch sponsorship deal offered by 888poker because of an unruly incident on the football field. The biting incident did not go well with the higher ups at 888poker and the popular online gambling site of Australia did not waste any time in announcing the termination of the sponsorship deal with Suarez with immediate effect.
This quick action by 888poker is truly justifiable and Suarez would have learnt a lesson by now for his wrong doings on the football pitch.