Tottenham's Dele Alli has apologised for a video in which he appeared to mock an Asian man and joke about the coronavirus outbreak.
The England midfielder posted a video on his Snapchat account of him wearing a face mask in an airport departure lounge on Saturday, accompanied by the message: “Corona whattt, please listen with volume.” Alli then zoomed the camera towards an unsuspecting man of Asian appearance before panning to a bottle of antiseptic hand-wash captioned: “This virus gunna have to be quicker than that to catch me.”
Alli, who had been heading to Dubai for a short holiday during the Premier League winter-break, subsequently deleted the video after a number of complaints.
The 23-year-old later apologised and said he had "let himself and the club down".
“I’d like to apologise for the video I posted on Snapchat yesterday,” Alli said in a video released on the Chinese social media platform Weibo.
“It wasn’t funny. I realised that immediately and took it down. I let myself down and the club. I don’t want you guys to have that impression of me.
“It isn’t something that should be joked about. Sending all my love and thoughts and prayers for everyone in China.”
A spokesperson for Tottenham said: "Dele has recognised he made a grave error of judgement and has issued two separate apologies."
