Luis Suarez is once again on the back pages for all the wrong reasons. 

Tuesday night’s game between Uruguay and Italy will forever go down as the game when Suarez bit Italian defender Giorgio Chiellini in the shoulder.

That alone is a disgraceful act but factor in the fact that it is the third time the Uruguayan has bitten someone during a match and what should happen next becomes clear. 

Fifa have the power to ban the striker for up to two years and should hit him with at least a year. 

Liverpool fans will argue that a year out of football is a very harsh punishment but Eric Cantona was banned for nine months in 1995 for his kung-fu kick on Crystal Palace fan Matthew Simmons.

Rio Ferdinand was banned for eight months for missing a drug test in 2003.

On both occasions it was the Football Association who handed out the punishments but Fifa have to take a strong stand here and show one of the world’s greatest strikers that he is not above the rules. 

This is a player who has a chequered past to say the least.

A seven-match league ban for biting PSV’s Otman Bakaal while playing for Ajax in November 2010, an eight-game suspension in December 2011 after being found guilty of racially abusing Manchester United defender Patrice Evra and a 10-match suspension in April last year for biting Chelsea’s Branislav Ivanovic.

These punishments are obviously not enough to stop the striker from reoffending.

And his excuse for his latest misdemeanour is laughable: “These situations happen on the pitch. We were both just inside the area, he struck me in the chest with his shoulder and he hit me in the eye as well.”

The video clearly shows Chiellini hit out at Suarez after he is bitten and who wouldn’t react the same way?

Suarez is a player who feels the English press have an agenda against him and maintains he has done nothing wrong.

He is defended by his managers and teammates who feel that the world is against the striker and that he is misunderstood.

But he is a repeat offender who hasn’t learnt and can no longer be defended.

Fifa has opened disciplinary proceedings and gave Suarez and Uruguay until 5pm yesterday to provide evidence but there is no case to defend.

Sources close to Fifa say that the punishment has to reflect reality: “What’s the difference between what he did and a head butt? Or a deliberate elbow?” the source said. 

It seems Suarez will serve a four-match ban minimum and only at international level.

For the sake of football, it should be longer.