Everyone is total agreement that the abuse handed out by a Liverpool supporter to Oldham Athletic defender Tom Adeyemi was despicable, disgraceful and has no place in any section of society.

A man has been arrested and bailed over the incident, and you can only hope that if the person concerned is found guilty of the offence he is prosecuted to the full extent of the law.

In life we are all responsible for our own actions – and if this man is convicted he will only have himself to blame for his gross stupidity. He may well be contrite, he may well regret what he said for the rest of his life, but, if the law decides he said it then its no one else’s fault.

That said, you do have to wonder if Liverpool Football Club could have handled the Luis Suarez affair in a different way, and you do have to wonder whether, if they had, this abuse of young Adeyemi, who is on-loan from Norwich, would have happened.

It has been reported in the press this week that some at Liverpool do wish their response had been different with yesterday’s I newspaper saying that it was now acknowledged that those infamous Suarez t-shirts the players – including Suarez – and Manager Kenny Dalglish wore before and after the game with Wigan were something of a mistake.

Even at that stage it was widely agreed that Suarez had used what might be considered to be offensive language towards Patrice Evra. Whether he meant it in an offensive way or not (indeed there is absolutely no reason to believe that Luis Suarez is a racist) will never be proven, but the words were said and that should have been the end of the matter.

But it wasn’t. Instead Liverpool carried on their fight, threatening appeals and refusing to apologise, until, it seems they looked at the fixtures and saw what the games were coming up after the eight games were served (Man Utd and Everton in case you didn’t know) and decided to accept the punishment.

In many ways you would have had more respect for the club if they had continued with the appeal. If they truly do believe that they were right, and that their player had done nothing wrong then surely they should have just gone ahead and fought their corner.

The fact is that Luis is not an angel. He is no stranger to controversy. He gave away a penalty in the World Cup Quarter Final against Ghana, and whilst it is easy to say that any player would perhaps have made that decision to handball, any player might nit have bitten an opponent, as Suarez did in Holland last season (for which he was banned.)

For all his faults (and the fact he is far from a prolific striker is not least of them) Suarez is a fine, fine footballer, blessed with tremendous skill, and one who is hugely popular with both the Liverpool fans and his team mates. That perhaps does not excuse the wearing of those t-shirts. Suarez, however much he wants to paint himself as such is not the victim here.

It is not a giant leap to suggest that those t-shirts, the lack of an apology, the continued adoration and support has created an atmosphere where the issue of race has become a little more raw at Anfield than it might have been. And on this occasion it was a young defender on loan from Norwich to Oldham who had to suffer the consequences.

Oldham Athletic themselves have praised Liverpool for the way they handled the affair, but Piara Powar, Executive Director of anti racism organisation F.A.R.E, believes they haven’t gone far enough: "I'm afraid there is no question that the club's approach has stoked this affair, and there is now a highly charged atmosphere around the issue. The Suarez T-shirts surely no longer have a place at Anfield,” Powar said.

"This has done a lot of damage to Liverpool FC and in many people's eyes to English football.
But it is time surely that progressive fans stepped forward and started to be active in this debate……[and] show support to Adeyemi at this weekend’s game.

“I would say it is time for progressive fans to tell the club and Kenny Dalglish that enough is enough, this episode has done a lot of damage to Liverpool FC, and the manager, as their spokesperson, needs to publicly start to calm the waters.

“A club position that says, enough is enough, Suarez is serving his ban and everyone at Liverpool should move on and try to build bridges, would be very welcome."

And the sooner this happens and we can back to talking about Liverpool on the pitch instead of off it, the better.