A BBC DOCUMENTARY where footballers speak on their experiences of racism was released this month, where one player who grew up in Bradford, although not a victim of racism himself, speaks on how he thinks it has affected his team-mates.

Watford's Tom Cleverley, who was born in Basingstoke but raised in Bradford, appears in 'Shame in the Game', sharing his views on the racist abuse directed at his team-mates in a 2019 FA Cup semi-final win over Wolves.

Andre Gray, Troy Deeney, Adrian Mariappa and Christian Kabasele all received racist abuse after Watford’s 3-2 victory.

In the 25-minute long piece, Gray and Deeney recount the abuse, as Gray says, “All you’re doing is living your dream”, before screenshots of some of the abuse are shown.

“You’re getting called everything under the sun. Nothing got done about it - the police didn’t do anything and the FA didn’t pay any attention. It’s not the best place to be in.”

Deeney, who has scored over 100 goals in his time at Watford, says, “After that game, where we got a barrage of abuse, I had to take off comments [on his Instagram posts] because it was non-stop.”

In an episode of the YouTube series Barbershop Talk, in which Gray and Mariappa also appeared, Deeney said, "I’ve reported at least 60 incidents [of racist abuse on social media], and all I got back was ‘the monkey emoji isn’t racist’"

Cleverley, who went to Hanson School, Bradford, said in the documentary, "I think [the abuse after the Wolves game] was a huge eye-opener for everyone of how direct and personal the abuse got.

“Football matches and stadiums are probably the most passionate, and maybe aggressive, environments you’ll be in, but racism can’t be your go-to way to let off steam, it’s unacceptable."

Also featured is Dover Athletic's Inih Effiong, who was racially abused by Hartlepool fans after celebrating a goal he scored against them and then booed afterwards.

"When I got the ball, I had three-and-a-half thousand fans booing me, I felt like I was getting booed because I'm black", he said.

Renee Hector talks about how she was racially abused on the pitch by an opposing player and, after tweeting about it, by people online: "I've been struggling and feeling sort of isolated", she said.

Marvin Sordell, who retired from football last year aged just 28, for mental health reasons, said, "One of the biggest contributing factors to me retiring was the amount of racism that exists in the game."

Imrul Gazi, manager of Sporting Bengal United, also stars, and said that, as a result of racism, "You fear for your children when they leave for school in the morning."

He says that overt racism may not be as common today, but that does not mean that racism does not exist: "Gone are the days when you're physically or verbally abused, it's now a different type of racism we're experiencing - the whole structure and set up of the football pyramid is not inducive to supporting a club like ours."

Shame in the Game is available to watch on BBC Three and BBC iPlayer.