KICK It Out have once again called for football and social media companies to do more to rid the platform of racists, after Manchester United players Axel Tuanzebe and Anthony Martial were subjected to vile messages on Wednesday night.

Following United’s defeat to Sheffield United, the duo received a torrent of racial abuse, ranging from monkey and gorilla emojis to a string of racist terms.

With every game across the English football pyramid beginning with players taking a knee in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement, Wednesday’s incident was a further reminder to the authorities that more needs to be done and Kick It Out chair Sanjay Bhandari repeated his message of there being “real-life consequences” to those online offenders.

Bhandari said: “We are disappointed that players are continuing to be subject to racist abuse on their social platforms, it is completely unacceptable.

“We will continue to work with the football authorities, law enforcement and social media companies to try and rid football of hateful and discriminatory behaviour.

“As we have said before, online hate must have real-life consequences, so people don’t continue to spread hate as freely as they wish.

“The individuals responsible for this abuse will hopefully be identified by the social media platforms and swiftly removed.

“We know that discriminatory abuse can have significant real world impact on the welfare of the victims. We encourage the players to get such support from their club in the first instance, and support is also available from the PFA and Kick It Out.”

United released their own statement, brandishing the abusers “mindless idiots” and adding their voice to the calls for social media companies to stop this from happening again.

“Everyone at Manchester United is disgusted by the racial abuse received by players via social media after last night’s game.

“We utterly condemn it and it is encouraging to see other fans condemn this on social media also.

“Manchester United has zero tolerance of any form of racism or discrimination and a long-standing commitment to campaigning against it through our All Red All Equal initiative.

“Identifying these anonymous mindless idiots remains problematic. We urge social media platforms and regulatory authorities to strengthen measures to prevent this kind of behaviour.”

Earlier this month Kick It Out convened a meeting between a range of football, media and law enforcement organisations and social media companies to discuss how to tackle online hate.

The topic of discrimination and abuse was also subject of a virtual call led by Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden and Sports Minister Nigel Huddleston this week as part of the government’s discussions on the “Future of Football.”

Jordan Henderson, Karen Carney, Tyrone Mings, Paul Elliott and Anton Ferdinand were among those involved in a meeting called by ministers in which they laid out the Bill due to come before Parliament this year.

The Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport said the law “will require tech firms to take action so that what is unacceptable in the street and in stands, is unacceptable online too.”

Culture Secretary Dowden said: “To hear players talk about the level of abuse they have faced was humbling.

“Their input today has strengthened my resolve to bring in new laws to ensure there is much greater accountability from the social media platforms for dealing with such problems.

“As we shape the ‘Future of Football’ and look towards our football governance review, we must tackle issues around discrimination and lack of equality of opportunity head-on.

“I am grateful to this group of players for sharing their experiences and expertise to help the government’s work.”