The former Brighton and Hove Albion footballer Connor Goldson has spoken out after a row over racism blighted a Europa League tie.
Goldson, 28, who captained Glasgow Rangers as the Scottish champions lost to Slavia Prague at Ibrox on Thursday (18 March), was racially abused during his stint at Brighton.
The sport’s European governing body UEFA said that it would investigate the “incidents”.
On Friday, Goldson told Sky Sports: “I’m really proud of the way the club handled it but I don’t think I’ve ever had hatred on a football pitch like I did yesterday.
“I’ve never really been angry on a football pitch to that extent. But I genuinely despise them.
“Me and the whole team waited for them in the tunnel for a whole 45 minutes and they didn’t come in.
“I’m proud of every single team-mate, every member of staff in this football club, from the chairman coming down to support us to Ross Wilson the director of football, to the manager standing by us.
“I respect them 100 per cent because they didn’t try and usher us away because the club might get in trouble.
“This is beyond football. There’s so much speech about how to eradicate it, how it’s getting better, but it’s not getting better at all. It’s getting worse.
“You come into the changing room after the game and you see boys with monkey or banana emojis all over their social media, getting called words that a white person could never imagine being called. It’s horrible.”
Confrontation erupted on the pitch after Slavia Prague defender Ondrej Kudela was alleged to have racially abused the Rangers midfielder Glen Kamara.
Afterwards, several Rangers players were subjected to racist abuse on the social media platform Instagram, including Kemar Roofe, who was sent off during the match.
Goldson said that not enough was being done to rid football of racism and token gestures were not enough.
When England beat Bulgaria 6-0 in Sofia in October 2019, the match was stopped twice because of the extent of the racist abuse from the home fans.
Although the match came close to being abandoned, Bulgaria were fined just £65,000 and ordered to play two games behind closed doors – with one of those suspended for two years.
