Ex-Liverpool striker Luis Suarez has admitted that the fallout from biting Giorgio Chiellini was ‘one of the toughest days’ of his career.
Suarez left Anfield in 2014, just weeks after he had been hit with a four-month ban from all football-related activity by FIFA for the attack on the Italy defender.
The Uruguayan, 30, has won two La Liga titles and the Champions League since joining Barcelona, who agreed a deal worth £75 million to secure his Reds’ exit.
But Suarez has lifted the lid on the hurt which accompanied the final weeks of his time on Merseyside after being banished from his country’s World Cup squad.
“I suffered. I’m a human being that suffers and has feelings,” he told Sport.
“My daughter was aware of what her dad was going through.
“We were going to get on the plane on the way to Rio to play against Colombia and my family told her not to get on the plane, that her dad had to leave.
“Imagine that. It was one of the toughest days of my life. I am a father. I have feelings.
“Then when I came to Barcelona and I had to train in a gym because I couldn’t go to the training ground.
“It hurt a lot. [My kids] kept asking me why I wasn’t playing. To be honest, it really hurt.
“Above all because I am not like that, I am a softy and my family know that.
“My kids know that their dad is a human being and he makes mistakes and they know anyone can make mistakes.
“I hurt (my wife) Sofia because I lied to her. She asked me [about biting Chiellini] and I denied it. I had trouble believing it, let alone saying it.
“I couldn’t understand it. I hurt her because she knew I wasn’t like that. [The press] even asked her how I was at home.
“They could have been thinking anything. And that hurts. Everyone has their way of playing, their character.
“If I wasn’t as I am, I wouldn’t have arrived here [at Barcelona].”