What the Portsmouth boo boys don't see when they target their own players

And the smart-Alec flak aimed at a midfielder who has transitioned between two of the most unwanted playing statuses has gone on, fuelled by the ready availability of memes, gifs and, of course, the safe distance from their target behind a keypad and anonymity of a social media account.

Boo-boy target to treatment room forgotten man is the dark passage travelled by Morris in an injury-ravaged year at Fratton Park.

None of the vitriol fired in the midfielder’s direction has been particularly original or clever, while some has edged into the realms of poor taste. And an element has been downright nasty.

Thankfully, the man himself isn’t going to delve too deeply into the viper’s nest which we all know the online world can be these days, Pompey or otherwise.

Maybe Love Island will provide enough of a distraction for the trolls for the time being, or the real deserving numpty kicking off in Ken’s Kebabs gets the flak he warrants after going viral.

There’s a long line of deserving people embracing infamy these days who should be getting it before a footballer who’s taken his body to a place few others supporters would for their football club.

Because what fans didn’t know as they were sharpening their keypads over the 23-year-old’s start to his Pompey career, was he’d been playing with the injury which eventually saw him undergo surgery.

Morris was struggling to get through games as the abdomen pain he was suffering became unbearable. Yet, as he toiled his detractors had made their minds up without knowing the details.

It’s a scenario Lee Brown is familiar with as he battles to overcome the Achilles injury which eventually became too big a burden on his season.

It’s eight games out now for the 29-year-old but the outlook is positive about his return which was scheduled for next month.

Again, Brown’s had knockers who seem to have grown in volume this term as they proffer their opinion about his standing in the historical hierarchy of the club’s left-backs. The fact is you don’t even need to have been a particularly long-term follower of the club to come up with a string of inferior players in the vice-captain’s position.

Even without the knowledge Brown has been playing through pain that much is clear, but you probably don’t have to go too deep on social media to hear he’s the worst left-back to have worn the star and crescent and all the other nonsense comments.

You’ll be greeted with a shrug when debating the merits of being judged without people being aware of the full facts by the player himself. Instead, Brown understands opinions are like that part of anatomy we all have and is referenced in the phrase.

It would be easy not to take such a phlegmatic stance, however, when you’re being harangued and you’re a shadow of your true self.

Sean Raggett is another who’s had his critics this term. Perhaps he’s not the easiest on the eye and following Matt Clarke into the centre-back position was setting any successor up for a fall.

Raggett, though, arrived in the summer after recovering from catching his foot on the turf at Elland Road, causing two major ligament injuries and a broken ankle. His return from an issue of that severity on top of elbow and hamstring problems have been the backdrop for his Pompey career to date, for a player who’d not known injuries before being dealt that hand.

So, is it any surprise it’s taken the 25-year-old time to settle? Yet, flak has been quick to fly even when the stats show when Raggett plays Pompey usually get results - P 22, W 14 D5 L3 at the current count.

When mocking for some cheap laughs and likes is only a few characters and a GIPHY search away, it’s easy to overlook the potentially dark places footballers can be taken. Morris himself admits keeping his sanity over the past 12 months is one of his best achievements

Not because of opinions though, but his solitary existence as he searches for the answers for his unrelenting injury issues.

They first surfaced when the former England age-group captain felt a problem in the abdomen when moving to the area in March. That led to a groundhog day sequence of rehabilitation and recurrence before the Hartlepool man eventually travelled to Germany for surgery in October.

That was expected to put his problems to bed, yet proved another false dawn as the pain continued.

When following his recovery programme Morris has lived the life expected of him when, no doubt, it would have been tempting to let standards slip when your time is spent travelling between a gym and an empty flat 300 miles from friends and family.

There’s been whispers about an agreement over the remaining 18 months of his contract, but Morris future in every sense is an uncertain one.

Perhaps some context shines a light on these players’ situations which are easy to overlook or not consider at all when launching brickbats their way.

People, with some justification, can point to the fact this is nothing new in football or Pompey life. Matt Robinson, Michael Smith, Carl Tiler, Kyle Bennett, Kal Naismith and even a player of Jed Wallace’s calibre have felt Fratton hostility from their own fans over the past 20 years.

But, by the same token, the venom behind it now is mutating into something jarringly different to what went before. Perpetuated by trolls, this is something darker than airing some frustration from the stands on a matchday.

Of course, the players know the rules of the game and what they sign up for when it comes to entering a sphere where everyone is quick to form an opinion, and, despite their trials, they would be the last to ask for our sympathies.

But when people take aim with their jibes are they thinking about what their reality is like? How demoralising, mentally challenging and despairing it can be?

From a human point of view, you’d hope their behaviour would be different if they took a second to do so.