As reported by Sky Sports, Manchester United striker Anthony Martial has become the latest name to be targeted online.
Following United’s poor 1-1 draw against Sam Allardyce’s West Brom on Sunday afternoon, Martial is understood to have received a barrage of racial comments on his Instagram.
Martial was named in Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s starting 11 and although the attacker failed to set the game alight, of course, it goes without saying, he did not deserve to be racially targeted.
The French star, who has nearly 6m followers on Instagram, received a series of comments which included the words “Gorilla striker” followed by a long-line of the gorilla emojis.
The abusive comments endured by Martial mean he is now the third United player to have publicly received racial abuse, following recent incidents involving Marcus Rashford and Axel Tuanzebe.
Manchester Evening News’ senior football writer Samuel Luckhurst recently took to his Twitter to explain how he had personally reported the comments left on Martial’s post.
However, shockingly, Luckhurst claims the social media giants have refused to take action on the grounds that the comments ‘did not violate their community guidelines’.
Following the comments received by Martial, Kick It Out’s head of development Troy Townsend said: “Let me break my Sunday silence and just say here we go again. It’s so predictable now, it makes a mockery of Instagram’s comments.
“I wonder if this account will be barred for a month and collect their ‘Insta slap on the wrist’ and ‘don’t do that again’ talk.”
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