Italy midfielder Jorginho is leading a UEFA campaign to fight online abuse alongside Lyon’s Wendy Renard and Aston Villa’s Alisha Lehmann.
The Respect initiative will commence at the Women’s European Championship, which starts on July 6.
UEFA have said the programme will run alongside the Real Scars campaign which was created to highlight the “devastating effects of online abuse directed at football players, coaches and officials across social media platforms and educate them on how to best defend themselves against such abuse.”
Jorginho said: “Online abuse is horrible because people don’t think about what it can cause. It has an effect on you and the people who love you.”
The issue of online abuse in football has grown in recent years with several players even cancelling their social media accounts.
A recent report in Gazzetta dello Sport suggested Paulo Dybala, who is a free agent after leaving Juventus and has been heavily linked with a move to rivals Inter, had deactivated his Instagram notifications due to the abuse he was receiving.
UEFA are also releasing a five-part documentary series entitled Outraged, which looks at the effects of online abuse and features former Juventus and Inter midfielder Patrick Vieira as well as Jesús Tomillero Benavente, the Spanish referee who retired due to online abuse.
Such a delicate world
he just can’t take the heat from missing penalty kicks….
Jorginho deserves all the online hate that he can get. It’s his fault we’re not at the World Cup..
@Carletto had Italy have qualified what would it have been first round elimination?
Jorginho “abused” the Italian national team, nation and fans around the world by his horrendous play including missing 3 critical PKs in a row, maybe he should compensate us for his abuse!