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Football London
Football London
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Kaya Kaynak

Willian confirms he is the latest Arsenal player to have suffered racist abuse on social media

Willian has confirmed that he is the latest Arsenal player to have received racist abuse on social media.

The Arsenal winger took to Instagram to share screenshots of multiple messages he had been sent.

He accompanied the pictures with a message saying "Something needs to change! The fight against racism continues."

The Brazilian is the most recent Gunners player to have been targeted by online abuse this season after a series of incidents.

Eddie Nketiah received racist messages on Thursday after posting on social media ahead of Arsenal's Europa League clash with Benfica.

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It also emerged this week that Granit Xhaka was on the end of racially motivated abuse in the aftermath of his red card against Burnley in December.

Earlier in the season Nicolas Pepe received racist comments too after his own dismissal against Leeds United in November.

In the aftermath of that incident Arsenal released a statement condemning all abuse that Pepe have received.

“We utterly condemn the vile abuse directed at Nicolas Pepe and Ezgjan Alioski on social media following our match against Leeds United," read the statement.

“This is completely unacceptable and we will be working with the police and authorities to do everything we can to trace and prosecute the culprits.”

This latest incident comes as pressure builds on social media companies to do more to act in the face of racist abuse that football players are facing online.

Arsenal managing director Vinai Venkatesham looks on (Photo by Chris Brunskill/Fantasista/Getty Images)

Arsenal Chief Executive Vinai Venkatesham said earlier this week that they need to do more to protect players on their platforms.

"The abuse of so many of our black footballers on social channels is probably and possibly the biggest problem we have in the game at the moment," he said at the Financial Times Business of Football event.

"Footballers, referees and officials are all human beings and have feelings like anybody else and we really cannot overstate the impact that social media abuse can have on an individual.

"This has to be a wake up call. It's increasingly becoming normalised and in 2021 we can't be having a conversation about it becoming normalised. I'm not saying it's simple, easy with a silver bullet to solve it but players and social media companies need to come together.

"It's a moment in time and if we don't make progress I worry about the path we're heading on. We need the support of social media companies here.

"We can’t do it alone. How do you explain to a black footballer that if a piece of pirated content goes up, it gets taken down in minutes but that isn’t the same for racist abuse?”

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