Steven Gerrard calls for social media change as Rangers take an online stand against racism

The Premiership champions announced on Friday evening that their players and management will take a week-long break from all social media platforms.

Midfielder Glen Kamara has alleged that he was racially abused by Ondrej Kudela during the Europa League clash with Slavia Prague last month.

And both he and striker Kemar Roofe have been repeatedly targeted on their social media accounts as the instances of abuse towards players has increasingly alarmingly in recent times.

Gerrard himself has millions of followers on his Instagram account and he has backed his players for taking a stand in an attempt to highlight the scourge of racism.

Gerrard said: "Glen has been the focus of a lot of it, so has Kemar Roofe and we’ve had other situations as well.

"We feel it’s the right thing to do. Swansea and Birmingham have done something similar and it came onto the agenda when speaking to the senior players here and the board over the last couple of days.

"We decided it was the right thing to do. It’s not going to make a massive change but it keeps it at the forefront of people’s thinking.

"This will only get changed once the people in power change it – ie governments, ie UEFA, ie the SFA. People who are in powerful positions to make change in football.

"Because it’s obvious the social media platforms are not listening. This has been on radio stations and TV outlets for weeks and months. Instagram are not listening, Twitter are not listening and Facebook are not listening.

"Because people can just set up false accounts, do what they want to do and get away with it. That’s not right in my opinion.

"I support my players in taking this stand for a week and from there we will decide what we do next."