Scared FA? Lets Ave' You!

It has just been announced by the FA that Lucas Paqueta's 'Bet hearing' has been postponed until the summer, which, to the delight of Potter and Paqueta himself, allows him to play for the club freely until the remainder of this season.

The hearing with the FA was expected to happen late this January, yet it was delayed until March due to unknown reasons and has now been rescheduled to the end of the season! It seems all a bit too convenient!

Back in October, Lucas Paqueta had decided that he'd had enough of the media attention after some key confidential details were released about the case, such as the alleged bets that had been placed and the amount of money they were for.

It is currently understood that the FA are investigating 60 people who placed bets on Paqueta to receive a yellow card, with the prices ranging from £7-£400.

With the details released in the public domain, good ol' Paqueta back in October decided to go on social media and criticise the FA for deliberately leaking details of the case, as well as claiming that "Some of that information is entirely false and appears designed to undermine my position".

Paqueta then informed the media that he'd also asked his lawyers to write to the FA to request that they conduct a thorough investigation into how it found its way into the public domain, the FA has yet to reply to this.

The persistent delays from the FA can be taken in numerous ways, is the glass half full or half empty? This is the way the case seems currently. You could say, on the one hand, that the delays perhaps mean that they don't have enough evidence to charge him, and they're just trying to buy time. Or, you could see it as a negative and that they're evidently not going to give up until they have him bang to rights, which currently, from what we know, they don't have at all.

It is utterly pathetic for the FA to conduct the investigation of how they've done so, if the alleged leaking details to the media are true, then it goes to show what levels they're willing to go to in order to take down the Brazilian international.

With the clock ticking for the FA, there are only so many times the hearing is delayed. Eventually, their clock will run out, and it'll all be over.

They expected it to be as easy as Sandro Tonali's case, in which he was banned and suspended from Football for a 10-month period, which had been confirmed within a month of the initial allegation coming out.