London: Premier League club Brentford have condemned the ‘vile harassment’ of Ivan Toney after the striker received racist abuse via Instagram.
Toney has previously received racist comments on Instagram posts and Brentford have called for decisive action and criminal prosecutions.
“We are angered and frustrated to report that Ivan Toney has been subjected to racist abuse on Instagram once more,” the club said in a statement. “We have initiated investigations into this vile harassment which we condemn in the strongest terms.”
Last March, an individual received a three-year stadium ban for engaging in abusive behavior towards Toney on social media. Nonetheless, Brentford contends that insufficient action has been taken to penalise the offender.
“Sadly, this isn’t the first time Ivan has had to deal with this. A similar incident occurred just four weeks ago, leading us to identify an alleged perpetrator whom we reported to the authorities. To date, we have yet to see any action taken against that individual.
“In general, the response from social media platforms to these ongoing issues has been underwhelming. Their solutions, such as filters to simply hide the abuse may safeguard the players, but miss the mark entirely and do not discourage the offenders. Without real consequences for those responsible, the cycle is doomed to repeat,” it added.
However, Brentford did express their belief that there that things can improve to ensure better conditions for players in the future.
“We do have faith that things can change. We appreciate the dialogue that we have with the likes of Meta but we call for more decisive and urgent action to combat online hate. We call for prompt investigations, and importantly, we call for criminal prosecutions,’ the statement further read.
IANS