Raheem Sterling sends message to ‘racists’ after England players abused in Montenegro and demands action

He added the hashtags #2019 and #getsomeeducation, following a match which was overshadowed by reports of monkey chanting towards England players

Raheem Sterling has responded to the alleged racist abuse he received throughout England’s 5-1 Euro 2020 qualifying victory in Montenegro, tweeting a picture of his defiant celebration in front of home supporters with the message: “Best way to silence the haters (and yeah I mean racists).”

He added the hashtags #2019 and #getsomeeducation and later demanded football’s authorities do more to tackle racism following a match which was overshadowed by reports of monkey chanting towards England players.

Gareth Southgate said that he had heard racist abuse directed at his left-back Danny Rose at the end of the game as the full-back was being shown a yellow card, and the manager said the Football Association would be making an official report.

Earlier Sterling had celebrated scoring by cupping his hands and smiling towards some of the home supporters, and speaking afterwards, the Manchester City forward demanded more is done to stamp out racism.

“All of us know what skin colour we are so they’re not saying anything new,” Sterling said of the fans chanted abuse.

“It’s 2019, I keep saying it, and it’s a shame to see this keeps going on. We can only bring awareness and light to the situation. It’s now time for the people in charge to put a real stamp on it. You’ve got to punish people a bit harder, you’ve gotta do something that makes them think twice.

“If you can’t play in front of fans then that’s going to make them think harder.”

England winger Callum Hudson-Odoi also condemned the abuse. “It’s unacceptable and hopefully Uefa deal with it properly because when I went over there and heard it, they were saying monkey stuff.”

It comes only months after Sterling was allegedly racially abused by a Chelsea supporter at Stamford Bridge. Afterwards he posted a powerful message on social media highlighting how the media was “fuelling racism”.