The Football Association is investigating Mario Balotelli's apparent anti-Semitic and racist social media posting, with the English game’s anti-racism tsar insisting the player should be charged for his behaviour.
Liverpool striker Balotelli sparked a race row on Monday night after posting and quickly deleting an image on his Instagram page depicting the computer game character ‘Super Mario’ alongside a racial stereotype and anti-Semitic remark: “Jumps like a black man and grabs coins like a Jew”.
Balotelli subsequently insisted he was using “humour” to express anti-racist sentiments, something that may see him escape the full force of the FA’s sanctions for discrimination.
But the chairman of Kick It Out, Lord Ouseley, said the controversial striker should not avoid punishment altogether.
“Quite frankly, I think the FA has got to show consistency in everything it does and I don’t see how it can avoid charging him,” Ouseley told Telegraph Sport.
“Whether it then takes other factors into consideration is a matter for its panels, such as all the implications of what its intentions might have been.”
Ouseley said players had no excuse for making the kind of blunder that, at best, Balotelli was guilty of.
“They’ve got guidance, they’ve got rules, they get advice, and if they want to do stupid things, they’ve got to pay the consequences,” he said.
“Whilst you can have humour in tackling these things, you’ve got no control over how that humour is being interpreted and what damage it might be doing.
“It’s just recklessness and recklessness is not an excuse any more.”
He added of Balotelli, whose career is littered with controversies: “It’s typical Mario Balotelli. He does things impetuously. He’s a silly boy and he needs to grow up.”
Ouseley's criticisms were echoed by the Board of Deputies of British Jews, who said they were "concerned" about Balotelli's posting.
President of the Board Vivian Wineman said: “Balotelli's sharing of images which use unacceptable language and appeal to classic antisemitic tropes is troubling. We were pleased to see his immediate retraction and apology but such language has no place in public discourse. We welcome the decision by the FA to investigate this matter.”
The FA have contacted Balotelli over is posting - he has until 6pm on Friday, Dec 5 to respond. The governing body's guidelines regarding when to charge someone over a comment on social media state "deleting an inappropriate posting, whilst advisable, does not necessarily prevent disciplinary action being taken".
The Italy international will be spoken to by Liverpool, with the club awaiting further contact from the FA.
"We are aware of the posting which has since been promptly deleted by the player. We will be speaking to the player about the issue," said a Liverpool spokesman.
The controversial image of Super Mario appeared with the heading "Don't be a racist". The text then read: "Be like Mario. He's an Italian plumber, created by Japanese people, who speaks English and looks like a Mexican, he jumps like a black man and grabs coins like a Jew."
Mario Balotelli's Instagram post (since deleted)
After criticism began to mount online, Balotelli deleted the offending item and responded on his Twitter account: "My Mom is jewish so all of u shut up please". He also described reposting the image as "my Unlucky moment".
Balotelli also posted an apology on Twitter, stating: "I apologize if I've offended anyone. The post was meant to be anti-racist with humour. I now understand that out of context may have the opposite effect.
"Not all Mexicans have moustache, not all black people jump high and not all Jewish people love money. I used a cartoon done by someone else because it has Super Mario and I thought it was funny and not offensive. Again, I'm sorry."
Liverpool have been embroiled in a racism row before when former striker Luis Suarez was banned for eight matches for racially abusing Manchester United defender Patrice Evra in September 2011.
The minimum FA ban for a race-related offence is five matches.
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