Mark Palios

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Mark Palios,(born Liverpool 9 November 1952) is an English chartered accountant, football administrator and a former professional footballer.

He played professional football for Tranmere Rovers and Crewe Alexandra. Following a successful career as a chartered accountant, he became the English F.A.'s chief executive. In the scandal that linked Sven-Göran Eriksson to Faria Alam, an FA secretary, he was forced to resign. He was born of an Irish ( Limerick ) mother and a Greek father.

It was under his FA administration that Manchester United defender Rio Ferdinand was handed an unprecedented 8 month ban from professional football, for missing a drugs test. Despite Ferdinand's immediate attempts to rectify the situation at the time of the drugs test, and his being cleared of any illegal substance use by a hair roots test, the appeal made was rejected.

A previous case, that of Manchester City player Christian Negouai, was almost identical except that Negouai made no immediate attempt to contact the club or the FA at the time of the test. Negouai was given no ban from football, and this case was cited by Ferdinand's defence, but to no avail. The later case of Lazio defender Jaap Stam saw him test positive for steroids, the Italian administration handing out a comparatively brief five-month ban.