PLAY THE ADVANTAGE

Update, April 24: Ramires has accepted an FA charge of violent misconduct, and received a four-game ban with immediate effect.

After what seemed like an extraordinary amount of time, FA has finally charged Jose Mourinho, assistant coach Rui Faria (both, above) and midfielder Ramires for their behaviors on April 19 against Sunderland.

Ramires has been charged with violent misconduct for hitting Seb Larsson in the face. (You think?)

He has until Thursday, April 24 to respond.

Faria has been charged with two counts of improper conduct for abusing fourth official Phil Dowd and having to be restrained from physically attacking referee Mike Dean. His case has been labeled “non-standard”, meaning he could face a longer ban.

He has until Monday, April 28 to respond.

Mourinho has been charged with being a jerk face bringing the game into disrepute by questioning the referees’ integrity and suggesting ref chief Mike Riley was directing his referees to fix the title according to “objectives”

He has until Monday, April 28 to respond.

This means that, with appeals, both Mourinho and Faria will be on the touchline for this weekend’s pivotal match with Liverpool, and Ramires could actually play.

As a neutral, I find this appalling.

I don’t really care about Mourinho. He says stupid stuff all the time and what he said didn’t hurt anyone. He wasn’t violent.

Ramires was violent, and Faria would have been if he’d been allowed to be.

We know that Chelsea will take no action (unlike Newcastle) and neither man has apologized. So, there’s no reason to believe that they understand that violence is unacceptable, and they most surely will appeal, because they don’t understand that they’ve done anything wrong.

If their contributions help Chelsea defeat Liverpool, I think some very serious questions need to be asked about why it took so long to announce charges that were clear to anyone watching the replay video.

Read the story on the FA’s website.