Police contacted as Willock faces ‘appalling’ racist abuse

Joe Willock, a midfielder, was the target of “appalling” racist abuse on social media, and Newcastle United has contacted police.

Willock received the abuse on Instagram following Newcastle’s 2-1 defeat against Fulham at St James ‘ Park on Saturday.

Before Rodrigo Muniz scored late on to give Fulham the lead, the 25-year-old was a substitute for the second-half and missed a chance to put Newcastle 2-1 up.

Newcastle called for action from social media platforms to stop players from receiving screenshots of some of the abuse Willock experienced.

” Newcastle United firmly condemns Joe Willock’s egregious racist abuse on Saturday night on Instagram. There is no room for racism anywhere”, read a club statement.

Joe has a lot of backing from the club, and we will continue to do everything to make sure the welfare of our supporters, staff, and players is ensured.

The club urges all social media companies to do more to stop this behavior from their platforms and reports the abuse to Meta, the owners of Instagram.

The club will support the most severe legal action against those responsible, adding that the club has also reported the abuse to the police.

A spokesperson for Northumbria Police said: “Shortly after 21: 00 GMT yesterday]Saturday], we received a number of complaints about a post on social media.

” As a result, an investigation is ongoing.

“We want to make it clear we condemn all forms of discrimination”.

The Premier League said it was “appalled” by the abuse and would support the investigation, adding it would “where possible take action against any individual we are able to identify”.

Following the controversial sending of Arsenal’s Myles Lewis-Skelly to the media during their win at Wolves, police opened an investigation into “threats and abuse” directed at referee Michael Oliver.