Nearly a dozen people have been arrested over the online racial abuse of England players following the Euros 2020 defeat against Italy.
Marcus Rashford, Jadon Sancho and Bukayo Saka were victims of abuse after they missed penalties in the shoot-out final at Wembley last month.
It led to condemnations by the Prime Minister, England manager Gareth Southgate and the Football Association.
Out of the 207 posts on social media identified as criminal, 123 accounts belong to individuals outside the UK, the UK Football Policing Unit said.
A total of 34 accounts have so far been identified as being in the UK, and 11 of these account holders have now been arrested.
Chief Constable Mark Roberts, National Police Chiefs’ Council Football Policing lead, said: ‘There are people out there who believe they can hide behind a social media profile and get away with posting such abhorrent comments.
‘They need to think again – we have investigators proactively seeking out abusive comments in connection to the match and, if they meet a criminal threshold, those posting them will be arrested.
‘Our investigation is continuing at pace and we are grateful for those who have taken time to report racist posts to us.’
Those arrested include three people from London, two from Christchurch, one from Runcorn and one from Sale. Others were located in Reading, Folkestone, Shrewsbury and Worcester.
It comes as new data found that more than two in five Premier League players were subject to racist abuse on Twitter during last season.
Online hate detection company Signify tracked abuse on the platform and said that 20% of abuse was directed at four players, who they did not name.
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