[St Charles Owl]

Racist abuse is unacceptable in every walk of life, HOWEVER The FA bottled it.

They said ‘not proven’ instead of it wasn’t said the way Bong thought it had. 2lip reading experts say he didn’t use racist comments and Bongs testimony at first was he didn’t use the word black when informing the referee. The refs report differed from Bongs too.

Actually the lip reading experts did not say he didn't use racist comments, they both stated that there wasn't a camera angle that allowed them to be able to lip read what was said. Here is an exert from the Beeb on what was stated by the FA:

In the reasons explaining its verdict, the FA said the "essential issue for us boiled down to one question - are we satisfied the player [Rodriguez] probably said to GB [Gaetan Bong]: "You're black and you stink'?

It said the two lip-reading experts "could not help" on this "core issue".

"The player's mouth was obscured, and neither could see sufficient to interpret his moving lips," the FA said.

Essentially the FA ended up in a situation where one player said he heard one thing and the other player stated he said something else - it came down to a he said, she said, and in the absence of any other evidence the not proven verdict worked for both parties. The couldn't prove Jay said anything racist and they couldn't prove what Bong claimed he heard was incorrect. Not sure there was any other conclusion they could come to in this case.