Following the Hatters’ emotionally charged statement in reaction to striker Elijah Adebayo’s disgusting insult this week, Luton manager Rob Edwards felt it was time to take a position against online racial abuse directed against their players.
Unfortunately for the 26-year-old, this is not the first time he has received similar abuse, as the forward was subjected to similar abuse less than a year ago following Premier League matches against Tottenham Hotspur and Nottingham Forest, only to see such a disgusting taunt rear its ugly head again on Wednesday evening during the 2-1 defeat to Sunderland at Kenilworth Road.
After reporting it to Town’s administration, Adebayo saw the Hatters write a ground-breaking response to the individual responsible, inviting him to Bedfordshire if he ‘had the balls’ to confront Adebayo directly. The powerful message read: “We will unwaveringly support Elijah. To the person who cowardly dropped into Elijah’s direct messages: We know who you are, and you know who you are. You are not a faceless account, which we have unfortunately become accustomed to reporting in recent years.
“But if you have the balls to come to Kenilworth Road and say it to his face. We dare you. If you do, you’ll be faced with everyone at Luton Town Football Club, standing side-by-side with Elijah. Abuse of any kind is unacceptable. But does everyone know that? It’s why we are doing our bit to educate everyone that racism and all forms of abuse is abhorrent and unacceptable.”
“The way that the statement went out and how strong it was, I think it’s really, really landed with people. It’s probably captured one or two people, because we believe in it, we stand together and there is a part of you that wishes these people could not hide behind a keyboard and come and stand in front of six foot five Eli and try and say that, but that’s not the world we live in now.
“We’re a family here, we always say that and we look after our own. We want to stand with Eli on this and support him. Unfortunately it’s not just him and I don’t think it was just him either the other night, but it’s not the first time I’ve been here sat in front of a room full of people talking about this in my short time here and I’ve not even been here two years yet.
On how Adebayo had dealt with the abuse, which was tragically not the first time in his Luton career, the manager went on: “He’s well, obviously it’s not a pleasant issue that we’re discussing. It’s nice that you’re all here, though, since the comment clearly had an impact and landed, but Eli is OK. He is realistic in the sense that it has occurred before and will happen again, which is obviously very difficult to hear. But the entire matter is being handled really well, first and foremost by the football club, with Eli’s support and a forceful statement that I thought set a good tone.
“Meta have obviously closed the account and are doing what they need to do and the police are now investigating the whole situation. There’s been another statement from Sunderland today, we don’t know where the person was from, but both football clubs have dealt with it really well. It’s really frustrating, we want to be able to talk about football, but we’re not and this is a bigger thing than football as well, society and there’s a lot around it and how much change we can have.
“I suppose we’re in a position now within football to get our message out there maybe even more so than anyone else, with the reach that all of these outlets you guys have to get this across, it’s really important now that it lands. We are completely and utterly against any form of discrimination and in this instance now, racist discrimination. We’re 100 percent with Eli and all of our players and always will be, and hopefully we can see change.”
Although Meta, the American multinational technology company that own Facebook, Instagram, Threads, and WhatsApp, have confirmed to the Luton News that the account that was responsible for the abuse has now been closed, whether he thought more could be done by the social media companies to try and prevent this happening again, Edwards added: “A lot comes through the social media outlets now and I think Meta have done what they can do in deactivating the account.
“When you’re in this position as a football manager now, I’ve got to be able to make sure I say the right thing, but I don’t know fully what is being done by all the social media companies at the moment. It is the easiest way now for people to spread hate or to commit crimes now because they haven’t shown up in front of people’s faces and done it, it’s just the easiest way to hide behind a keyboard and commit these crimes.
“You can’t take phones or computers away from people, but it’s disgusting and it’s hurtful and to think we’re in 2024 now, like I said they’ll probably be another manager next week talking about the same thing and then next year. But hopefully if we keep batting home the right message, the punishments are really severe and we educate people, then hopefully we can make a difference. We’re in a moment now where we really can make a difference and these messages need to land.”
