Raheem Sterling is leading fresh calls to social media companies to step up and take real action after a ground breaking study revealed the alarming scale of online racism and abuse aimed at footballers.
Analysis of thousands of messages sent publically on Twitter to 44 current and ex-players during the six-week Project Restart period last season has revealed that 56 per cent of the abuse was racist and 43 per cent (13 out of 30) of the Premier League players were subjected to racist abuse.
A huge 50 per cent of the 3000-plus abusive messages recorded during the in-depth pilot study were sent to just three players - Sterling, Crystal Palace's Wilfried Zaha and Wycombe striker Adebayo Akinfenwa.