Zouma needs punishment... but most of all he needs help. Instead the club have let him and everyone down as well as poisoning their brand

He needs to be punished properly, absolutely he does.

He needs prosecuting, if truth be told.

He needs to feel the full force of public outrage over his abhorrent, despicable actions.

Every smidgeon of vilification that has come – and is coming – his way is warranted.

But Kurt Zouma needs help. He does not deserve help, but needs it.

Anyone who takes enjoyment from abusing a defenceless pet (right) in front of his family must be sick, surely?

Yet when West Ham United – and we are talking David Moyes AND the club’s ownership and board – instructed him to take to the field on Tuesday night, they did not just let football down, they did not just let normal society down, they let Zouma down... if you believe such a character can be let down.

Had they sacked him on the spot, not too many observers would have raised a murmur of dissent.

After all, that would have been the fate for a lot of people in a normal job. But they were never going to sack him. He is an asset, let’s be realistic.

But what they should be doing is trying to find out WHY he behaved so heinously.

Tell him he is not playing until he has received help and education.

On behalf of a civilised society, that would have been the responsible thing for West Ham to do.

Premier League football clubs cannot claim to be more than just monstrous commercial vehicles and then not confront and tackle behaviour from their ‘assets’ that is an affront to society.

West Ham know about one of their players having a serious issue that could, heaven forbid, escalate – and they appear to have done nothing meaningful.

Instead, it is a routine fine and the glaring implication that what he does away from the pitch has no bearing on his professional status.

Look, no one other than the reprehensible Zouma (above) is culpable in this horrid episode.

And what incentive has he now got to seriously address his behaviour? To ask himself WHY he did it? To get the mental help he so clearly needs?

He is a couple of weeks’ wages light, that’s it.

Premier League clubs like to feign concern about what their players do away from the club.

Yet some, West Ham now being the prime example, clearly don’t care as long as the players do the job on the pitch. On a purely cynical business level, West Ham have messed up, big time.

Had they said Zouma would not play again until he had undergone educational and psychological processes – and been heavily punished, of course – maybe the ‘brand’ would not have been poisoned.

Maybe the sponsors would have been more tolerant.

But it should not have been about that.

Hopefully, Zouma will be so remorseful, so appalled at what he has done, that he will seek help, seek to educate himself.

But rather than slap him on the financial wrist and send him out to face Watford, his club should have done that for him.