Regardless of whether he is found guilty of a racism charge, John Terry must be stripped of the England captaincy ahead of next year's European Championship. With the Football Association already probing the claims of Queens Park Rangers' Anton Ferdinand against the Chelsea centre-back, British police launched their investigation this week into what happened during the west London derby last month.
Terry's defence is the racist slur against Ferdinand only came out of his mouth while he was aggressively denying he'd used it at all. This would make little difference to Ferdinand who would simply have preferred the hateful words about him weren't polluting the air at Loftus Road in the first place.
Terry is trying to wriggle out of trouble on a technicality. It's a little like former US president Bill Clinton putting on his lawyer's hat a dozen or so years ago to make his infamous denial of sexual relations with former White House intern Monica Lewinsky.
Like Clinton, Terry is skirting around the truth as he argues about definitions. In the end, it came back to haunt the former Arkansas governor and it is likely to do the same for the 71-cap veteran.
When it comes to offensive expletives in relation to race, religion or culture in the sports' arena, there must be zero tolerance. In any context, these kind of insults are simply taboo. They can't be casually slipped into passing conversation as Terry claims happened.
Already, England's build-up to one major championship - the 2010 World Cup - was affected by Terry's antics. His alleged affair with the former partner of his teammate, Wayne Bridge, saw the latter hastily announce his international retirement a few months before the opening matches in South Africa.