Rio Ferdinand appears 'baffled' by FA punishment for use of the word 'sket' on Twitter

The QPR defender, who has been banned for three matches, appeared to respond to the ruling

QPR defender Rio Ferdinand has been banned for three games and fined £25,000 for an abusive tweet (Getty Images)

Rio Ferdinand appeared to endorse a tweet sent on Friday accusing the Football Association of applying double standards in handing him a three-match ban.

The QPR defender was hit with the suspension and a £25,000 fine on Tuesday after using the slang term 'sket' - taken to mean a promiscuous woman - on Twitter. The FA deemed that the tweet was abusive and that the breach of conduct was aggravated by the fact that it contained a reference to gender.

A tweet from the account flowingmindset sent on Friday afternoon accused the FA of a "double standard" in its treatment of Ferdinand compared to its handling of a text message exchange involving former Cardiff manager Malky Mackay and the club's former head of recruitment Iain Moody which contained sexist and racist terms, and also its treatment of a disciplinary case involving former top-flight referee David Elleray.

Ferdinand tweeted "preach!!" in reply to the message posted by flowingmindset and sent another in which he appeared to suggest the FA's punishment had "baffled" him.

The FA has yet to announce whether Mackay or Moody will face any action over their text message exchange, although it has been reported in the media recently that the pair may escape censure if the messages are deemed to be private correspondence.

Elleray, who is the chairman of the FA's referees committee, was ordered to go on an equality and diversity training course by the FA after making racist comments to a black delegate at a refereeing event at St George's Park in the summer but faced no further punishment.

A minute before his tweet to flowingmindset, Ferdinand wrote on the social media site: "Is humour even allowed....I'm baffled! Ludicrous.... & I don't mean the rapper."

Ferdinand is set to miss Saturday's Barclays Premier League trip to Chelsea and further matches against Manchester City and Newcastle under the terms of his suspension.

QPR manager Harry Redknapp, chief executive Philip Beard and chairman Tony Fernandes met Ferdinand and his representatives at QPR's Harlington training ground on Thursday to consider a potential appeal.

Redknapp leapt to Ferdinand's defence, labelling the former England defender a "top-class person".

He also received backing on Twitter from Rs team-mate Joey Barton on Friday, who criticised the FA's handling of Ferdinand's case.

"Can someone from the FA send me a list of offensive, ban-incurring words that I can't use online and the requisite bans attached to each," he wrote.

"The punishment (in the Ferdinand case) isn't fitting of the crime in my opinion.

"3 games is violent conduct. (John) Terry only got 4 games for racial abuse?

"3 games and £25k for a tweet? Come on."