Mikel John Obi has been given a three-match ban and fined £60,000 following the Football Association hearing on Thursday.
Mikel had requested a personal hearing after admitting an FA charge of using threatening and/or abusive and/or insulting words and/or behaviour towards the referee Mark Clattenburg in the match official's changing room at the end of Chelsea's fixture against Manchester United on 28 October 2012.
A statement by the governing body said: "The regulatory commission's independent chairman, Christopher Quinlan QC, emphasised that the independent regulatory commission accepted, as did the FA, that at the time he threatened the referee, the player genuinely believed that the referee had racially abused him. But for that factor the suspension would have been significantly longer," Press Association reported.
"Subsequently the FA investigated the allegation that the referee racially abused the player and found that there was not a case for him to answer."
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