Portsmouth slam ‘abhorrent’ racist message sent by fan claiming to support Pompey to Peterborough match winner Ivan Toney

The striker shared the abusive message he had received on Instagram from an account called Jack Churcher.

A screenshot of the message, which featured emojis of bananas and monkeys, was shared by Toney on Twitter with the caption ‘Again really’. 

The striker, who scored slotted home the winner during Posh’s 3-2 victory at Fratton Park on Tuesday night, had received a similar abusive message on Instagram following the match. 

In the screenshot shared yesterday by Toney, the account that the vile abuse had come from claimed to be Pompey fan with ‘Blues pup’ in the bio and a picture of Ronan Curtis. 

Pompey have issued a statement in response condemning the ‘abhorrent’ message. 

A club spokesperson said: ‘Portsmouth Football Club have been made aware of a racist message sent to Peterborough United player Ivan Toney on social media.

‘The individual who sent this abhorrent message claims to be a Pompey fan and the club will do everything in its power to identify them.

‘There is no place in football – or indeed society – for racism and it will not be tolerated at Portsmouth Football Club.

‘The club have reported this incident to the police and will work to assist them with any investigation.

‘We would also like to apologise to Ivan Toney for any distress this incident has caused.’

In a statement on Twitter anti-racism campaigners, Kick It Out, wrote: ‘Good to see swift action from both clubs on this incident and we applaud their uncompromising stance.

‘We have offered our support to Ivan Toney and again stress to social media companies that they need to do more to rid their platforms of discrimination.’

Following the emergence of the first racist message sent to Toney, Peterborough branded it as ‘wholly unacceptable’. 

A club statement said: ‘We are aware of a message that has been sent to one of our players on social media of a racist nature this evening.

‘The content of that message is wholly unacceptable and we will be reporting it to the football authorities, social networks and the police.’

Toney opened the scoring at Fratton Park in the 15th minute, before grabbing the late winner to dash Pompey’s automatic promotion dreams in the 75th minute.