IT IS ONE of those reports that brings to mind the old phrase about not leaving a stone unturned.

The thoroughness, attention to detail and remarkable depth of the 115-page document produced by the English Football Association’s independent commission and published by the governing body on Saturday night will have provided some uncomfortable bedtime reading for Luis Suarez and Liverpool Football Club over the weekend.

It is little wonder that Liverpool have said they need time to “read and digest and properly consider the contents” before making further comment. The report has prompted legal experts to talk of a document that is “appeal-proof”.

Paul Goulding QC, the chairman of the three-man panel that found Suarez guilty of racially abusing the Manchester United defender Patrice Evra last October, has brought a new meaning to the word transparency by revealing every last detail from the moment the two players clashed at Anfield to the day that the Uruguayan was given an eight-match ban and fined £40,000 – as well as every spit and cough in between.

Liverpool reacted angrily to the verdict when it was announced a little under two weeks ago, issuing a statement in which they referred to unfounded accusations that Evra had made in the past and described the full-back as “not credible”. The commission, however, paints a rather different picture of the player who made the allegations.

“In all the circumstances, we preferred the evidence of Mr Evra,” the report says. “His account was clear and consistent in all material respects. There is no basis for saying that he lied or was mistaken in what he heard.”

The words are nothing like as complimentary when it comes to Suarez. The commission found that Suarez used the word “negro” or “negros” seven times during the flashpoint with Evra in the second half of the 1-1 draw. It described the Uruguayan’s evidence as “unreliable in relation to matters of critical importance”, highlighting “inconsistencies between his accounts given at different times as to what happened”.

Suarez’s claims that he pinched Evra’s skin in an attempt to defuse the row and that his use of the word “negro” to address his opponent was conciliatory and friendly were rejected out of hand.

“To describe his own behaviour in that way was unsustainable and simply incredible given that the players were engaged in an acrimonious argument. That this was put forward by Mr Suarez was surprising and seriously undermined the reliability of his evidence on other matters,” the report says.

It was established, by Evra’s own admission, that the Frenchman had started the verbal exchange when he reacted angrily to a foul by Suarez five minutes earlier. Evra then said: “Why did you kick me?” Thereafter there are conflicting accounts of what happened.

Evra claimed that Suarez responded by saying: “Because you are black”. Suarez claimed he had replied: “It was a normal foul.”

In the next alleged exchange, Evra said he responded by saying: “Say it to me again, I’m going to punch you,” and Suarez replied: “I don’t speak to blacks.” Suarez’s representative, Peter McCormick, alleged that Evra had invented that comment to take revenge on Suarez for refusing to apologise for fouling him, an argument the commission dismissed.

The third exchange alleged by Evra was that he said: “Okay, now I think I’m going to punch you.” To which Suarez replied: “Dale, negro, negro, negro”, meaning “Okay, blackie, blackie, blackie”.

Suarez claimed he only said “negro” once during the confrontation, which was when Evra was alleged to have said “Don’t touch me South American”, when the referee blew his whistle to stop the corner being taken.

There were couple of inconsistencies in Evra’s accounts but, overall, the commission accepted his account of the exchanges because his “evidence was not seriously undermined in any material respect”.

Once the commission established that the FA charge against Suarez was proved, the automatic two-match suspension for using insulting words was increased to four because of the racial element.

“Aggravating factors” were then considered, including the number of times Suarez used the word “negro” or “negros“; the context in which the words were used; the fact that the FA has promoted campaigns to root out racism and that the words were targeted at a particular black player.

The mitigating factors included Suarez’s previous clean record in relation to charges of this type; the fact that Evra started the confrontation in the goalmouth; the personal embarrassment Suarez would face in the wake of the decision; the player’s charitable work with a football project in South Africa and his vow to never use the word “negro” on a football pitch in England again.

To date Suarez has received the full backing of his club, his manager Kenny Dalglish and the players. Whether they still believe the verdict can be overturned in the wake of this extraordinary report remains to be seen.