It seems that the Uruguayan football team is fated to progressing in the World Cup finals minus its star performer.

As this nation of three million people now contemplates its reduced prospects following the four-month ban imposed upon Luis Suarez for biting Italian defender Giorgio Chiellini in their decisive group match victory, one can only speculate on the thoughts which will be going through the mind of the Liverpool forward whose bolstered image in Britain made him the recipient of both the players' and the journalists' version of Player of the Year.

His sickened demeanour as he left the field following Uruguay's 1-0 win over Italy was a polar opposite to his joy after scoring the two goals which defeated England in the previous match. He knew the jig was up, having already incurred previous bans, for two matches and then ten matches, following other incidents of biting opponents.

A dejected Luis Suarez gets a hug from Uruguay's coach Oscar Tabarez after the 1-0 win over Italy in which he appeared to bite an opponent ©AFP/Getty Images

At the last World Cup in South Africa, Suarez left the pitch chaired by his fellow players having effectively sacrificed his own interests on behalf of the team having deliberately handled off the line in the last minute header to deny Ghana what would most probably have been the winning goal in their quarter-final.

Suarez was automatically sent-off, but the penalty was missed and 10-man Uruguay went on to reach the semi-final by winning the penalty shoot-out at the end of extra time.

Oscar Tabarez, the Uruguayan coach, attempted to justify Suarez's actions on the basis that they were "instinctive". Whether they believed that or not, the vast majority of Uruguayan followers seemed content with the result, with many going a stage further by openly glorying in his actions.

Luis Suarez is chaired off the pitch by his Uruguayan team mates after his deliberate handball denied Ghana what might have been a last-minute winner in the 2010 World Cup final quarter-final. Despite being sent off, Suarez saw his team win on penalties after extra-time
©AFP/Getty Images

There was further justification after the match from the former Uruguayan international Gus Poyet. "I was a little bit disappointed with some people talking about cheating," said the former Chelsea midfielder. "I think that is rubbish. That is taking one for the team. That is making something happen for the rest of their life. That is helping one country of 3.5 million people to get to the semi-final for the first time in so many years."

Could Suarez's latest effort also be described as "making something happen for the team"? It was certainly not long after this shocking incident that Italy lost the Uruguayan captain Diego Godin at a corner, allowing him to head the goal which took his team into the next round at Italy's expense. Unlike the footage of Suarez's bite on Giorgio Chiellini, the evidence for this interpretation was not conclusive.

Photographs of Uruguayan fans supporting Suarez's actions in 2010 were soon posted on social media, and they included a snap of a young male and a young female fan, both smiling broadly, the former brandishing,  a poster with the words "THANKS SUAREZ" on it, and the latter holding up one depicting a giant hand of Uruguayan blue.

Historically the impact this relatively small nation has made up the World Cup has been disproportionate, with national expectations being primed at a visceral level by the team's victory in the first two finals they entered, in 1930 and 1950.

In their eight subsequent appearances they have finished fourth three times -  in 1954, 1970 and 2010 - and reached the quarter-finals once and the round-of-16 twice.

It should be noted that Uruguay is, as the phrase goes, no stranger to controversy in the World Cup.

The very first World Cup final, between host nation Uruguay and near neighbours Argentina, very nearly didn't take place because of a wrangle over the match ball. And with the Estadio Centenario packed with 93,000 spectators six hours before the match the consequences of that occurring hardly bear thinking about.

Fifa eventually ruled that Argentina should provide the match ball for the first half, and the host nation for the second. Uruguay, already Olympic champions, added the World Cup winners title through a 4-2 scoreline – although they had trailed 2-1 at half-time.

Uruguay's Lorenzo Fernandez (left), Pedro Cea (centre) and Hector Scarone celebrate beating Argentina 4-2 on the home soil of Montivideo in the first ever World Cup final in 1930 - a match that was put in jeopardy by a dispute between the teams over the match ball
©Hulton Archive/Getty Images

The following day was declared a national holiday in Uruguay. In the Argentinian capital of Buenos Aires, the Uruguayan Consulate was pelted with stones by a mob. Who says sport doesn't bring people together?

Four years later, Uruguay (and Argentina) refused to play in the World Cup finals in Italy, in retaliation for the fact that numerous European nations had disdained to travel to Uruguay four years earlier.

And in 1938, Uruguay were again absentees from the party, this time in protest at the awarding of the finals to France when they claimed it should have gone by agreed rotation to a South American nation.

Suarez, meanwhile, has been given three days to appeal, with Uruguay's round-of-16 match against Colombia coming up tomorrow

Luis Suarez holds his mouth, Giorgio Chiellini holds his shoulder - the aftermath of the incident for which the Uruguayan forward was banned for four months by FIFA ©AFP/Getty Images

There had been speculation that the FIFA, the international football body, might shirk or avoid this awkward issue.

In his recently published book Sex and Drugs and Sport and Cheating (DB Publishing), which ranges over an interesting number of topics, most pointedly the evaluation of claims currently being made by the producers of sports drinks and supplements, Paul Anthony, a former Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians concludes by adapting the poetic judgement of Dante Alighieri on the subject of opposing cheating.

Anthony uses the following quote from the 14th century Italian writer's masterpiece, the Inferno: "The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in times of great moral crisis, maintain their neutrality."

Dante can rest. FIFA appear to have risen to their challenge, even though some have expressed dissatisfaction that the sanction was not harsher.

"Such behaviour cannot be tolerated on any football pitch, and in particular not at a FIFA World Cup when the eyes of millions of people are on the stars on the field," said Claudio Sulser, chairman of the Disciplinary Committee.

The right thing has been done. And yet there is a lingering sense of regret that someone so sumptuously talented should have imploded in such a fashion. Suarez's lapses put one in mind of Hamlet's description of the "vicious mole of nature" that undermines a man, for all that his other virtues are "as pure as grace".

It was no surprise to see a tweet from Michael Owen, an instinctive goalscorer in the class of Jimmy Greaves or Gerd Muller (or Luis Suarez), expressing a similar polarity of expression on the subject of Suarez's (latest) fall from grace.

"I'm genuinely gutted," he said. "I love watching him play more than any other player but he obviously just can't control himself."

Meanwhile the former world heavyweight boxing champion Evander Holyfield, who had part of his ear bitten off in a fight with Mike Tyson in 1997, tweeted: "I guess any part of the body is up for eating."

After being found guilty of biting the arm of Chelsea's Branislav Ivanovic last year, Suarez was given a 10-game ban by an English Football Association panel. Which criticised Suárez for not appreciating "the seriousness" of the incident when he argued against a long ban.

Chelsea's Branislav Ivanovic reacts after being bitten on the arm by Luis Suarez during a match last season, following which the Liverpool forward received a ten-match ban from the English Football Association ©AFP/ Getty Images