Brentford’s Ivan Toney is targeted by sickening racist abuse on Instagram

Ivan Toney has been targeted by racist abuse after he scored twice in Brentford‘s win over Brighton on Friday night.

The Brentford striker posted screenshots of a message sent from an Instagram account in the name of Antonio Neill in which he was called a ‘black c***’.

Toney also posted the Instagram picture feed of the alleged abuser and wrote: ‘I wasn’t even going to post this but I woke up angry…’

MailOnline has tried to contact the account for comment.

A Brentford statement read: ‘Last night, Ivan Toney was subjected to disgusting, racist abuse via a direct message received on social media.

‘We condemn this discriminatory behaviour in the strongest possible terms. An attack on one of our players is an attack on all of us. 

‘Ivan will receive the full backing from the Club and from the Brentford fans who we have already seen condemning the abuse.

‘We expect strong support from the police, legal authorities and from Instagram’s parent company, Meta, to ensure that the individual involved faces the full force of the law for this despicable hate crime.’

Brentford striker Ivan Toney was targeted by racist abuse following Friday’s win over Brighton

Toney shared a screengrab of the ‘black c***’ message he was sent from an account apparently by Antonio Neill on Instagram

Toney shared screengrabs of the racist message and the sender’s Instagram account

Toney, 26, who was recently called up to the England squad for the first time, scored both Brentford’s goals in a 2-0 win at the Gtech Community Stadium.

They were his seventh and eighth goals of the Premier League season in just his 10th appearance and ended a run of three matches without a victory for the Bees.

It is far from the first time Toney has been targeted by racists.

He was left ‘disgusted’ after members of his and team-mate Rico Henry’s family were racially abused during the Premier League match with Everton at Goodison Park back in May.

Toney tweeted at the time: ‘And for the man that racially abused my family I’ll do everything I can to get you the punishment you deserve.’

The striker told Sky Sports News at the time: ‘You don’t expect that in this day and age at a football match to happen to anybody, let alone your parents, that are coming to support you – mine and Rico’s parents.

Toney netted twice in Brentford’s 2-0 win over Brighton in the Premier League on Friday 

Toney picked himself up to score his second goal of the game from the penalty spot

‘Off the back of winning, you’re just thinking about getting the three points and it was a good feeling. 

‘Hearing that straight away, you switch to anger and being upset that your family, which has come to support you all those miles, experience that straight after a victory.

‘It’s sad that I’m still having to sit here and talk about racism without my family just going to a game like any normal person and having a normal day. 

‘Emotions sometimes get the better of people but it should never come out that is a reason for being racist. You can be angry with certain results but never should you jump to discriminate someone by the colour of their skin or whatever.

Toney was called up into the England squad for the first time ahead of the September games

‘We can’t paint all the Everton fans the same way, I’m sure it’s just one, silly individual and the embarrassment of it is I believe his son had to grab him away from doing further damage. It’s just disgusting and we need to put an end to it as soon as possible.’

In January 2021, Meta – then Facebook – deleted the account of an Instagram user who racially abused Toney by sending the N-word in a private message.

In April of the same year, Toney shared a private message sent to him after Brentford had drawn with Birmingham that included the word ‘monkey’ and a number of monkey and banana emojis.

Toney wrote: ‘Honestly, I’m done.’