England football star Tyrone Mings has accused Priti Patel of “stoking the fire” after several players received racist abuse in the wake of the Euro 2020 final against Italy.
His criticism of the home secretary came after she described her “disgust” at the bigoted vitriol levelled towards Marcus Rashford, Bukayo Saka and Jadon Sancho online, with Ms Patel having previously dismissed the team’s decision to protest racism by taking the knee before games as “gesture politics” and suggesting fans had a right to boo the players for doing so.
Tory MP Johnny Mercer suggested “the painful truth is that this guy is completely right” in response to the Aston Villa defenders’ comments, which came after former Tory Party chairwoman Baroness Warsi accused “some in politics [of] still playing fast and loose with issues of race”, adding: “It’s time to stop the culture wars that are feeding division.”
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