Brendan Clarke-Smith reveals death threats after taking the knee comments

Brendan Clarke-Smith has revealed that he was the victim of online abuse after he made comments on the Black Lives Matter movement and supporters of it for taking the knee.

The gesture has been part of Premier League football since the competition resumed in the summer of 2020 during the coronavirus pandemic, following the death of George Floyd at the hands of police in the United States in May of that year.

In June Brendan Clarke-Smith wrote: “To suggest that fans 'aren’t quite understanding the message', as Gareth Southgate has done, is an insult to their intelligence.

“Fans understand perfectly well - they are just sick and tired of being preached and spoken down to. They are there to watch a football match, not to be lectured on morality.”

Speaking with GB News on The Afternoon Briefing with Gloria De Piero, he said: “After I made the comments about taking the knee, I had one particularly unpleasant message that was sent to me and it said basically, about kneeling on my children's necks until they were dead because they wanted me to feel that pain.

“Now, I don't have children, I only have one child and you know, it's a keyboard warrior. But even so I mean I had to speak to my wife about that and kind of brief her beforehand just to say, look, please don't get upset with this.

“Don't take it too personally. It's just idiots on a keyboard.

'It's not going to happen in real life, but I think sometimes people forget in terms of the security we have.

“My house, you know, it's been fitted with panic alarms and new locks and everything. And my wife said, why are we getting these? And you tell some of the stories that colleagues have had.

“In my case, it was just a threat, the police dealt with it, they were great and so on. But it just does make you worry in future that something actually bad could happen."

The comments were sent via email to his office and the sender was arrested and cautioned by police.