Imagine if one out of every three messages you received was insulting. Imagine it was from someone you don't know and will never meet, that it contains some combination of racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic or ableist remarks, and that it threatens you or your family. Imagine this happens to you every day for years. Many elite athletes don't have to imagine.

The findings of a study commissioned by the International Olympic Committee (IOC), conducted by Loughborough University and released earlier this year, show that "up to one-third of posts now containing negative content [are] targeted towards sporting stars". Cricket has yet to conduct similar research but a mountain of anecdotal evidence suggests the findings will be similar. Let's look at the 2021 T20 World Cup as a case study.

India's tournament opener was against their biggest rivals, Pakistan. It was a one-sided contest that Pakistan won by ten wickets, chasing 152 inside 18 overs. Mohammed Shami, the only Muslim player in India's XI, was also the most expensive bowler in the match. On social media he was blamed and bullied by India supporters, some of whom called for him to be dropped from the team and others who labelled him a traitor. The overarching theme of abuse was Islamophobic hate.

Virat Kohli, India's captain then, used his next press engagement to issue a stern response, referring to the abuse as "literally the lowest level of human potential that one can operate at".

Two and a half weeks later Hasan Ali dropped Matthew Wade in Pakistan's semi-final. At the time, Australia were 20 runs away from victory with ten balls remaining and the wicket could have been game-changing. Wade hit his next three deliveries for sixes, Australia won the match and went on to lift the trophy.

By then, Hasan had only just found the courage to turn on his cellphone. "I couldn't use it for at least two days," he says. "I wasn't able to sleep and then we went to Bangladesh for a tour. So when I was a bit relaxed, I picked up my phone." Comments on his next few Instagram posts made reference to the dropped catch, most of them used abusive language, and some urged him to quit the game. As recently as September last year, just before the ODI World Cup, someone juxtaposed a picture of a little girl letting a balloon slip through her hands with a picture of Hasan training in the gym.

Temba Bavuma has experienced the harsh glare of the spotlight, both in conventional media and social, over the last year or two © AFP/Getty Images

The other semi-final was between England and New Zealand, and England's bowlers were unable to defend 166. Chris Jordan, the only black player in England's XI, went wicketless and was the team's most expensive bowler on the day. He faced racist abuse that he only spoke about a year later.

"Social media, it was relentless for me - [on] Twitter and Instagram there were lots of [racist] comments on my pictures and in my direct messages because we had lost a World Cup game. People felt that I had a big part to do with that," he told David Lawrence in an episode of the ECB's Changing Room show.

These three examples highlight some interesting aspects of how sportspeople are treated on social media. Not only are they easier and more immediately accessible to the general public than ever before but because of their high profiles, they can be targets of some of the most extreme forms of othering, such as religious intolerance, racism, sexism or homophobia, often by people who remain nameless and faceless on the other side of a screen.

"You cannot underestimate the effect of cyber-bullying," Emma Sadleir, a social-media expert based in South Africa says. "We know that it is so much worse [than in-person verbal abuse] because it's faceless. We know it's worse because it's anonymous, because there is nothing the subject can do to find, understand or even know the harasser. And we know that it's 24/7."

Although it may seem that being reviled by people you know and whose names you recognise would be worse than dealing with comments from those who are nameless, the bullying that comes from unknown persons too can have long-standing damaging effects on sportspeople, as Andrea Geurin, professor in sport business and director of the Institute for Sport Business at Loughborough University, explained in the study's findings. Emotional abuse "is extremely challenging to moderate against and can result in significant psychological harm for the athlete," the study said. Words can and do hurt, especially when they are "hateful, discriminatory" and used in the service of "emotional forms of harassment".

Steven Finn, the former England bowler, had a playing career that coincided with the rise of social media and views it as a space of absolutes. "The most dangerous thing about it is that it builds people up to be the best thing in the world or the worst thing in the world," he says. "There's no in-between, which is something I struggled with.

Steven Finn: "No one really goes on to a social media platform and says, 'Oh yeah, he had a fairly decent day today.' It's either 'He was amazing' or 'He was awful'" Simon Cooper / © PA Photos/Getty Images

"You believe the hype when you are doing well and then you believe all of the bad talk when you're not doing quite so well. You never really get anyone who goes on social media, whether it's a journalist or someone who has just picked up their phone to tweet, no one really goes on to a social media platform and says, 'Oh yeah, he had a fairly decent day today.' It's either 'He was amazing' or 'He was awful.' As a player you have to have the discipline to be able to filter that out, which can be very tricky."

Finn made his Test debut in 2010, four years after X (then called Twitter) first launched and six months before the birth of Instagram. He played an instrumental part in England's last Ashes series win in Australia, in 2010-11, and is the youngest player to reach 50 Test wickets for England. Everything was going well, including his relationship with social media.

"My initial interactions were all positive because the early part of my career was all positive," Finn says. "I really enjoyed it for those first few years because very rarely would you get a negative message." Three years later, though, he had lost form and confidence and was struggling to remodel his action to avoid breaking the non-striker's stumps in his delivery stride, which, by then, was deemed a no-ball. He was sent home from the 2013-14 Ashes tour and referred to as "not selectable" by England's coach, Ashley Giles.

"For the rest of my career, that word followed me around, particularly on social media," Finn says. "I found unkind articles that got retweeted or reposted, tagging me in it. Often there were inaccuracies and I was hurt by those inaccuracies."

When he returned in mid-2015, he made an immediate impact and took 8 for 117 in a Test against Australia but the good times did not last too long. He played the last of his 36 Tests in 2016 and his last international the following year, but spent six more years on the county circuit hoping to get back to his best before retiring in August last year because of a knee injury that kept him out of action for several months.

At one point Finn decided to distance himself from social media because it showed him a life he could not have. "I wasn't playing for England anymore, I wasn't playing in tournaments and I wasn't close to playing for England. I'd go on to social media and see other people's lives and how amazing it was, and it made me feel bad about myself. It made me feel like my life was inadequate compared to other people."

Virat Kohli is consoled by his wife, Anushka Sharma, after India's defeat in the 2023 World Cup final. Anushka has for long been trolled online for supposedly bringing Kohli poor results in cricket © AFP/Getty Images

In his new role as a commentator Finn has started posting on Instagram again and has returned to X, which he prefers as a platform because "it's less show-offy and more information-based", but admitted it can be "a cesspit if you go into the wrong places of it". The view that X has become a more hostile place since Elon Musk took over and sacked about half of the 7500-strong staff is widespread. Last year advertisers reduced their spend on the platform by almost half.

Sinalo Jafta, the South Africa wicketkeeper, has experienced social media from a different angle than Finn, but with similar conclusions. She faces an intersectional triple-whammy of being a professional sportswoman who is black and whose body does not fit western beauty standards of being tall and slim with a small waist and narrow hips. Unlike Finn, she also did not shoot the lights out in her early performances. Jafta bats in the lower order, has an ODI average of 13 and a T20 average of 17.1, and has faced criticism over her inclusion in starting XIs because of those numbers as well as for her gender, race, and body shape.

"Of the comments I'd get, 'useless' was high up there," she says. "Or, 'Why the hell are you playing?' Or [saying] I don't deserve to play for my country and I am just there to fill numbers."

The idea of players being selected to fufil a quota is particular to South Africa, where there is a transformation target in place that requires the national team to field, on average over the course of a season, six players of colour, of whom at least two must be black African. Often those black players are accused of not being good enough, and social media bullying on the grounds of race is widespread.

In June last year, FIFA released a report into online abuse of participants at the 2022 football World Cup in Qatar. Racist posts accounted for the single largest category of abuse - 18% at the World Cup (compared to 38% at the previous African Nations' Cup and Euros). In particular, the three black English players, Marcus Rashford, Jadon Sancho and Bukaya Saka, were the targets of a significant amount of abuse after missing penalties in the Euro final.

In cricket, one of the most notable victims of racist abuse in recent times has been Temba Bavuma, as Jafta can testify. She was a television pundit for the 2022 T20 World Cup, where Bavuma came under severe scrutiny for lack of runs, and called the comments posted about him "savage". His loss of form at that tournament - he made just 70 runs in five innings but kept his place in the XI because he was the captain of the side - fuelled the narrative that he was not good enough, which spilled over to infect talk about him in the other formats.

Sinalo Jafta: "Because of what I saw on social media, when I had s**t games, it was my outlet. I was having a terrible time and then I'd go read that and I would go have a drink" Marco Longer / © AFP/Getty Images

In 2023, Bavuma led South Africa at the ODI World Cup. He became a father shortly before the tournament started and travelled to join the squad in India shortly after being at his child's birth. At the captains' press conference, he appeared to have fallen asleep, though in reality, it was an unforgiving camera angle of him looking down at his hands. Nonetheless it became an insulting viral photograph.

Once again, he was the lowest run-scorer in South Africa's top five, which resulted in more jibes, including memes of him sat in a wheelchair pushed by his team-mates. In 2024, when USA batter Aaron Jones, who has an uncanny resemblance to Bavuma, scored an unbeaten 94 in their win over Canada at the T20 World Cup, more posts sprouted, insinuating Bavuma had changed his name, grown a beard and found a less competitive country to play for.

His only response to his social media critics has been to dismiss them. "I'm not someone that's going to answer to calls from people shouting on Twitter or Facebook," he said in an interview after the 2023 World Cup.

Jafta's take on the situation, though, says it is not one that can easily be brushed aside. "In front of people you can laugh about it but when you go back to your room, that's when it hits you.

"My silencer was alcohol. Because of what I saw on social media and when I had s**t games, it was my outlet. I was having a terrible time and then I'd go read that and I would go 'Cheers, mate' and have a drink. Everyone saw I was struggling long before I did.

"Alcohol was my coping mechanism to balance the noise. And there was a lot of it."

Jafta checked herself into rehab in October 2022, four months before the home T20 World Cup, with the knowledge that doing so could put her place in the squad at risk. After 56 days in treatment, she was ready for a new start and went on to become part of the first senior South African side to reach a World Cup final. She used that opportunity to speak out about how social media bullying almost cost her her career, dragging her into addiction, and to talk about her journey to sobriety.

Social media expert Emma Sadleir says litigation against abusers is close to impossible in most cases, and so blocking them, and if necessary, deactivating your social media accounts temporarily is the way to go © Emma Sadleir

The abuse didn't stop, though. "After that I saw a comment saying, 'What happens if she gets dropped: is she going to drink again?' That was a low blow," she says. "People forget that we are human first."

Memories are even shorter if the human concerned is a woman. "There's a whole underbelly of misogyny on the internet," Sadleir says.

According to FIFA, just under half of all the abuse female footballers at the 2023 World Cup received was sexual, sexist or homophobic, but female athletes are not the only targets of gender-based discrimination. The wives and girlfriends of male athletes also face abuse, with threats of violence against them, including rape, particularly prevalent.

In 2016, Kohli's ex-girlfriend at the time, Anushka Sharma, who he has since married, was the target of an outpouring of social media abuse with suggestions she be banned from public life, declared a national panuati (ill omen), and that her house should be stoned.

"Shame," Kohli responded on Instagram with a 114-word caption, calling out those who were "blaming and making fun of" and who "hide and take a dig" at Anushka. "Think of how your sister or girlfriend or wife would feel if someone trolled them and very conveniently rubbished them in public," he wrote.

India had just won the Asia Cup back then and Kohli was their leading run-scorer. His return to form came after a break-up with Anushka. During the disappointing 2015 World Cup - Kohli was 21st on the run-scorers' list - the two were still together. She attended some matches, including the semi-final where India lost to Australia and Kohli scored 1. Some spectators put two and two together and got eight.

Hasan Ali has been a target of abuse online but has made a conscious choice to have his family feature in his social posts - with their consent Ishara S Kodikara / © AFP/Getty Images

They concluded Anushka was the source of Kohli's struggles, blamed her presence when he underperformed and celebrated her absence when he scored runs. Kohli didn't see things that way. Though they were no longer together, he credited her in that 2016 Instagram post with giving him "more positivity", and let the world know that his defence of her was "a long time coming".

Kohli and his wife may have become a leading power couple in India but the online bullying has not stopped. As recently as June last year, Anushka was trolled for Kohli's poor outing in the first innings of the World Test Championship final. He continues to credit her when he achieves something of significance, doing so most recently after India's victory at the T20 World Cup.

Australian batter Travis Head's wife Jess and their one-year-old daughter Milla received rape threats after the 2023 World Cup final, which Australia won thanks largely to Head's 137. Glenn Maxwell's wife Vini Raman, who is of Indian heritage, was lambasted online for supporting Australia - an experience she posted about on Instagram. "Can't believe this needs to be said but you can be Indian and also support the country of your birth where you have been raised, and more importantly the team your husband plus father of your child plays in. Take a chill pill and direct that outrage towards more important world issues," she wrote.

Tabraiz Shamsi's wife Khadija was a target of hate after his phone-shoe celebration, which he pulled out when dismissing Suryakumar Yadav in a T20I against India last December. And David Warner's wife, Candice, was at the centre of a storm during the 2018 Test series between South Africa and Australia when a social media call to shame her went public.

Warner was involved in an altercation with Quinton de Kock during the first Test in Durban, allegedly over a comment de Kock made about Candice's relationship with rugby player Sonny Bill Williams before she met Warner. A group of South Africa fans, including a SuperSport producer and a popular presenter and comedian, made Williams masks to wear to the second Test in Gqeberha. They posted pictures of the masks on X, supplied fans with them at the games, and even got two Cricket South Africa officials - both of whom were subsequently suspended - to pose for photographs with them

Candice would later reveal she suffered a miscarriage after the events of that series. "I'd have to be bulletproof for the taunting not to have affected me," she told the Australian Women's Weekly. "It rocked my very foundation and I paid the ultimate price, losing our baby. I wonder how all those who came after me feel now?"

Candice Warner has said abuse on social media contributed to her having a miscarriage in 2018. "I'd have to be bulletproof for the taunting not to have affected me" Ryan Pierse / © AFP

The Warners' revelation of an intensely personal situation evoked much sympathy but also opened them up to more abuse, especially given Warner was banned from international cricket for 12 months for his involvement in ball-tampering during that South Africa series. Candice received a comment on her Instagram that read: "No money coming in now. Anything to make a buck. You wouldn't have had these dark days if your husband wasn't a cheat."

How much of their personal lives should sportspeople share, especially when it comes to areas of their life away from the game, such as their family or their politics?

"We know that support for progressive causes and things like that are often triggers for online abuse," Tom Moffat, head of the World Cricketers Association (WCA), says.

One of the most well-known examples of this is Usman Khawaja, who has been vocal in his support for people in Palestine amid the ongoing war there. After the ICC forbade him from wearing shoes with the words "All lives are equal" and "Freedom is a human right" on them, because they were viewed as political statements, Khawaja posted a video on X to explain that he was pursuing a humanitarian cause. He received support from people who shared his views but was also called a "first-class hypocrite", a "terrorist", and wished "many ducks this summer".

None of that has stopped him from posting about Palestine, and he is not the only cricketer to lend his voice to that cause. Hasan Ali has done the same. "I am emotionally attached with them - especially the children," he says. "If someone comes to my home and kills my children, how would I feel?

"I am just using the support of social media to tell the world Gaza wants peace. I want to tell them we are behind you and raise your voice on social media too. I can't go there and fight for them. I can only use social media. My only message and point is that all lives are equal and every single human has to live peacefully."

Tom Moffat of WCA: "Everyone has [rights to expression] and they're protected and enshrined in international law. Just because someone's an athlete shouldn't change that" © Tom Moffat

Similarly, other cricketers have supported other left-leaning causes on their platforms. Joe Root is outspoken on LGBTQI+ rights and champions the Rainbow Laces campaign, and Daren Sammy and Chris Gayle are among those who spoke out when the Black Lives Matter campaign had a resurgence in 2020. The WCA supports players' rights to express these views.

"We absolutely advocate for the players to be able to exercise their right to freedom of expression," Moffat says. "Everyone has those rights and they're protected and enshrined in international law. Just because someone's an athlete shouldn't change that.

"The recent stuff with Usman [Khawaja], for example, we would say there is a subtle difference - if you're putting things on a team uniform, it's a slightly different situation than using your own platform on social media. We understand [the difference is] not necessarily always straightforward. As a general rule, the guys and girls around the world have platforms and we absolutely want to empower them to use them, and they're in a position to do that. We've been really clear with players that these are rights that are protected in international law."

What about views that might be seen as more problematic, though? Last year, Facebook posts made by Bangladesh's Tanzim Hasan Sakib years earlier, which stated, among other things, that working women destroy society, surfaced, which prompted an investigation by the BCB. He was criticised by women's rights activists, writers and journalists, and apologised for hurting anyone's feelings (though not for the content of the posts). In 2021, Ollie Robinson was suspended after historic racist and sexist tweets were made public; a slew of other tweets from high-profile players also came to light, prompting an ECB review.

Does that then mean players' freedom of speech is effectively limited? "They have to remember the codes of conduct they operate under," Sadleir says. "They can't bring their teams into disrepute. They've got duties to sponsors, and contractual obligations, which people forget about. It's a delicate balance for them on what they share and what the consequences of that will be."

When it comes to privacy, the amount afforded someone differs according to their past conduct. "It's all about creating expectations," Sadleir says. "The more privacy you create around yourself, the more you have. If you don't look after it, you don't have it. The legal test is if you can show you have a reasonable expectation of privacy in a particular set of circumstances."

AB de Villiers is always careful to hide his children's faces or have them face away from the camera in media he posts online

She gives the example of Serena Williams, who has shared images of her daughter Olympia from when she was born (and even in utero) and throughout her childhood. Contrast that with a couple like AB and Danielle de Villiers, who have always blanked out their children's faces with emojis on social media pictures. If a photographer was to capture and distribute an image of Olympia Williams, no matter at what age, her mother is unlikely to succeed on a claim of breach of privacy but if the same were to happen to the de Villiers children, they could have a case. In other words: if you don't want people to know about your private life, don't make it public.

That is something Hasan, who has shared pictures of his wife, Samiya, and his two daughters, has discussed with his family, so they know they are public figures by choice. "My wife is very supportive. She is always beside me and always supports me. She knows the reality of my job and my personality," he says.

That does not mean she is exempt from the abuse. Being in the public eye, either because your profession demands it or by association, comes with the risk of being found online and harassed - which player associations are now taking seriously. "It's a well-being issue and a mental health issue and a workplace safety issue," Moffat says.

So what can they do to help players navigate this space? The WCA has a resource online that is accessible via their global player hub. "We've pulled together a number of education resources for players and there's one module, in particular, that relates to social media and online abuse and [provides some] basic tools that players can use to navigate that environment," Moffat says. "That's a global tool that's available to all the WCA professional players and intended to supplement the other education that goes on at domestic level, either by governing bodies and/or players' associations in their own countries."

The WCA resource provides players with some basic tips for dealing with abuse, which is in line with Sadleir's practical tips for players. "Block and report," is her go-to advice when someone has been abused online. The WCA takes "very much the same tone," Moffat says. "It looks at how you can block or mute or silence in the first instance, which is a bit sad that that is the first tool that's available to everyone.

"If you're starting to get into legal territory, then, you know, from our perspective, we'd obviously look at that, but nothing's come across my desk to date that's gone as far as that."

Joe Root wears a Rainbow Laces band on his wrist at the Headingley Test last year. Often, players' endorsement of liberal causes polarises views on social media Jan Kruger / © ECB/Getty Images

The WCA also has an anti-discrimination and harassment code, which is aimed at giving "a bit of an outline of expected behaviours and a port of call for people who feel like they don't quite know where to go with issues where they've been harassed or abused," Moffat says, but this work remains in its infancy, and the WCA still takes its lead from many of the member boards. "Most of these sorts of issues have historically always been reported at ground level or at domestic level in their countries, and often with these kind of things, there's an element of confidentiality around it. But we speak to players, and we speak to players' associations a lot, and we obviously know that this is an issue."

What can players who face harassment do to stop it? Very little, Sadleir says. "Even by reporting accounts [of abusers], with Facebook and Instagram, they will look at the reports but it's very subjective. It's a question of who you get [looking at your complaint], and even then, your report will most likely get 15 seconds in a back room somewhere, with someone who decides whether or not something has violated the community standards - which change all the time and which are very erratically applied. With Twitter, even when they had a workforce, they were very bad at monitoring. Now, under Elon Musk, it's the wild west. It's unmoderated."

Ideally, Sadleir would like to see social media companies apply much stricter controls and be more co-operative in releasing user information - known as basic subscriber information (BSI) - of people who abuse others. As things stand, it is near-impossible to get this. "If you're based in Europe, it's a lot easier because then, if you're dealing with a Meta company, you fall under Facebook Ireland," Sadleir says. "In South Africa and in much of Asia, we fall under the American branches, and while they do say they will hand over the BSI on court order, they will only respond to an American court order," she says. "I've done it once but it cost a fortune. Unless you've got a lot of money, it's impossible."

For those with the financial resources, who are able to obtain the BSI of their abusers, they could have legal remedies but even ascertaining the correct jurisdiction in which to begin proceedings is usually difficult. Sadleir says completing successful litigation is often so complicated that she advises against it, even in cases of persistent online abuse. "Often I would rather say, deactivate your account for a month. You've got to prioritise your mental health. Deactivate it for a bit until it blows over," she says.

Players have also created their own ways of safeguarding themselves. In England, sportspeople took part in a four-day social media boycott in 2021 to raise awareness about the abuse they suffered, and individual athletes have done so as well.

"I've made an effort to not have the Instagram app on my phone as much as I possibly can over the last two years," Finn says. "So I have to make an effort to go into my browser to engage with it." He does not go searching for his name online, and he has not posted on Instagram for two years. "I think anyone can have a really unhealthy relationship with the app," he says, "especially as my life is not perfect at the moment. I would love to still be playing cricket for England and playing in tournaments all around the world.

In a few years, a few levels higher up in their cricket careers, they might not be smiling about what they see about themselves online © Getty Images

"All my peers that I grew up with are still doing that. I go on social media, I see the guys around the world having a great time and I'm happy for them but it makes you feel inadequate as a person. I've done my best as a person not to engage with it as much as I possibly can."

Jafta has tasked someone she trusts with screening her feed and removing anything that could be upsetting before she looks at it. "I dont have the app, but I will log on to the internet and I will ask the person, 'Have you deleted anything?' and they will say, 'It's clean.'

"I went to those lengths because I don't want to entertain abuse. It's better not to see." She has also limited who can comment and what content she sees. "On Instagram my settings are that if I don't follow you, you can't comment - and I don't just follow anyone." She has also asked team-mates, friends and family members not to screenshot things they see about her online and send them to her - which they did in the past out of concern.

It could be argued that by taking these steps she is creating an echo chamber for herself, seeing and hearing only the things she wants to see and hear, and is in denial about what's really being said. But in some ways, aren't we all doing that? We can curate our social media feeds and try to make the algorithm see the things we enjoy so that we see more of it. Ultimately, as Hasan put it, we're just trying to create some kind of connection.

"I am just a natural person and a jolly person and I love to engage with people and tell them about my life. I feel that because fans come and spend time, sometimes all day, cheering for us, I want to use social media to connect with them," he says. "There are good people and bad people but I've found good people."

Firdose Moonda is ESPNcricinfo's correspondent for South Africa and women's cricket

© ESPN Sports Media Ltd.

 

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