Man gets three-year stadium ban for abusing Brentford's Toney in a landmark ruling

Antonio Neill has been handed a three-year stadium ban from every stadium in the UK. He has also been handed a four-month sentence suspended for two years. Neill sent the racist message to

over social media on October 14 last year.

star shared the abuse he received on his Instagram page, which led to a police investigation. They found the suspect in Blyth, and he pleaded guilty to at Court in January before being sentenced on Monday.

Brentford and Northumberland Police has described this as a "landmark ruling" because it is

"the first of its kind to be issued under the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022”.

Following the hearing, a Brentford Football Club statement said:

"Brentford FC is pleased to see the Antonio Neill case resolved and that Northumbria Police pursued this to a conclusion.

"Court appearances set a strong precedent for anyone else who commits hate crimes and it is our hope that sentences increase in severity until this sort of crime is eradicated.

"Ivan Toney has been subject to sickening racist abuse on a regular basis, and we want to see tough action taken against anyone found guilty of such abuse.

"The club firmly believes there is no place for racial abuse in football and we continue to support and implement a zero-tolerance policy towards discriminatory behaviour of any kind.

"All authorities have their role to play in this and we, again, call upon the social media companies to make their platforms safe for all participants and to remove all hateful content.”

Toney has scored 15 goals for Brentford in the

this season. Brentford is in ninth place in the table after 25 matches.

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