Liverpool's 'Balotelli 'Most Abused Player'

Liverpool striker Mario Balotelli is the most abused Premier League footballer on social media - and Chelsea are the most abused club.

That is according to research which shows for the first time the true extent of the number of abusive messages sent to players, clubs and fans on the Internet.

The statistics collated for anti-discrimination body Kick It Out show there was an estimated 134,400 instances of direct abuse aimed at Premier League teams and players between August 2014 and March 2015. It is also estimated there has been an abusive and discriminatory post every 2.6 minutes this season.

Balotelli received by far the most abusive mentions of a Premier League star analysed. More than 52% of the 8,000 abusive posts directed at him were racist according to the findings.

The Italy international was banned for one match and fined £25,000 in December after he posted a picture on his Instagram page which contained racist and anti-Semitic language, for which he apologised.

Arsenal's Danny Welbeck was second with 1,700 (50 per cent of the abusive posts directed at him were racist), followed by Liverpool's Daniel Sturridge, with 1,600.

Of the 134,400 messages, 39,000 were sent to players and more than 95,000 to clubs. Chelsea received approximately 20,000, followed by Liverpool who were sent 19,000, and Arsenal who had 12,000 aimed at them.

Kick It Out describes all the abuse as being 'discriminatory' - and estimates 37,632 of the posts to clubs and players contained racist language.

When broken into the different categories the discrimination is as follows:

- Race (28%)

- Gender (25%)

- Sexual orientation (19%)

- Disability (11%)

- Antisemitism (9%)

- Islamophobia (5%)

- Age (2%)

- Gender reassignment (1%)