WILLIAN HURT BY MESSAGES FROM RACIST TROLLS

ARSENAL winger Willian wants racist trolls to be made to pay and has urged football’s authorities to do more to support players as he opened up on ‘hurt’ caused by online abuse aimed at him and his family. Willian is one of a string stars who have been targeted and sent sickening racist messages this season. The Brazilian, who tonight takes on a Slavia Prague side caught up in a racism storm after a Europa League last-16 clash against Rangers at Ibrox last month, said: ‘If they want to criticise me, it’s no problem. I always accept that. ‘But when they come to attack your family with those words that I cannot say here, that hurts. It’s a big problem. ‘These people, they have to pay for that. I don’t know why they do it. ‘I’ve seen some people deleting their social media because of racism and the abuse. ‘Straight away, I want to do that. But then when you think, take a few minutes and relax a little bit more (it changes).’ Asked if he was afraid to look at his phone after matches, Willian admitted: ‘Yes. Sometimes, to be honest. ‘We are human. We are professional. We do the best to help the team. We always want to win, we never want to lose. ‘But sometimes you’re not on a good day. You have a bad day and they come and say these kind of words that hurt you. That’s why we want to stop it. Enough is enough. ‘To change it, we need the authorities to do the action. That’s it. I will never stop my fight against racism. ‘We have to find a way to change the profile of social media. People want to have Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, they need to put their ID, passport or whatever. And then when these things happen, we can catch them, the authorities can catch them. ‘I think they (the Premier League, UEFA and FIFA) have to support us.’