Cristiano Ronaldo & Harry Maguire Top Most Abused Premier League Players List

Cristiano Ronaldo and Harry Maguire receive the most Twitter abuse of any Premier League players, according to a new report.

On average 362 abusive tweets were sent daily, with seven in 10 Premier League players on Twitter abused Ofcom and the Alan Turing Institute found.

2.3m tweets sent in the aftermath of the Euro 2020 finals – which saw Bukayo Saka, Jadon Sancho and Marcus Rashford abused after missing penalties – were studied.

Ronaldo received the most abuse during the period examined, with 12,520 tweets. He received the most tweets overall – 576,915 in total – meaning 2.2 per cent of the messages he received were abusive.

Maguire was second in the list, with the England international receiving 8,954 abusive messages, meaning 14.90 per cent of the tweets Maguire received were abusive.

8 of top 12 abused players were from Manchester United including Bruno Fernandes, David de Gea, Fred, Marcus Rashford, Jesse Lingard and Paul Pogba – the latter two having left the club this summer.

Around one in 12 abusive tweets targeted a victim’s characteristics, like their gender or race.

Kevin Bakhurst, Ofcom’s group director for broadcasting and online content, said: “These findings shed light on a dark side to the beautiful game. Online abuse has no place in sport, nor in wider society, and tackling it requires a team effort,”

“Social media firms needn’t wait for new laws to make their sites and apps safer for users. When we become the regulator for online safety, tech companies will have to be really open about the steps they’re taking to protect users. We will expect them to design their services with safety in mind,”

“Our research shows the vast majority of online fans behave responsibly, and as the new season kicks off we’re asking them to report unacceptable, abusive posts whenever they see them.”