‘Actions speak louder’ – Pundit urges clubs to take action over recent racism

Kevin Phillips has claimed that it i time that clubs come together to take decisive action to stop players from being subjected to racial abuse on social media after Son Heung-min was the subject of hate online.

Son was involved in a controversial incident in the first half of Tottenham’s 3-1 defeat to Manchester United two weeks ago after Edison Cavani’s goal was ruled out by referee Chris Kavanagh, who deemed that the South Korean was fouled by Scott McTominay in the build up.

Replays showed that McTominay’s flailing hand had caught Son in the face but Ole Gunnar Solskjaer fumed at the Tottenham forward after the game for going down too easily and for the time he spent laying on the playing surface.

Some fans were also not pleased with Son’s antics and hurled racist abuse at 28-year-old.

Tottenham revealed that they had reported the racist abuse directed at Son to the social media platforms and are planning to meet with the Premier League to determine what can be done.

It was reported last week that all Premier League clubs could come together to boycott social media for a fixed amount of time in order to send a message to these companies that they have to do more to stamp out racial abuse.

Phillips admitted that he is fully in support of such a move and insisted that it was high time the clubs took decisive action.

When asked about the racist abuse directed towards Son, the former Sunderland striker told Football Insider: “Whatever can be done to stop it has to be done.

“It gets to a point where actions speak louder than words. Action needs to be taken. I think every player now has got a platform to speak up and voice their opinions.

“A lot of them have stayed quiet who have suffered racism over the years because nothing has ever been done about it.

“The more people that come forward… Something has to be done. It needs to be stamped out, it is disgusting. “I certainly back boycotting social media.”

Spurs Web Opinion

Unfortunately, I do not see how a temporary boycott of social media by clubs would force the likes of Facebook and Twitter to act. This will not change until all social media companies demand an ID in order to sign up and that is unlikely to happen since it will impact their bottom line.

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