Manchester City player Bernardo Silva has landed himself in hot water, following a couple of controversial posts on social media about defender Benjamin Mendy.
The Portugal international has recently shared a video in which he says the City star is “naked”, despite being dressed from head to toe in black.
Not the first time he’s been racist.
Here’s Silva joking about Mendy being naked because he’s wearing all black.
Some would call this form. Imagine for one second Suarez doesn’t this. pic.twitter.com/2ncEorOolG
— . (@wr_ghty) September 22, 2019
And Silva posted a picture onto Twitter comparing Mendy’s likeness to that of the character on a packet of Conguitos chocolates. For context, the illustration resembles that of early 19th century ‘minstrel show’ characters.
The Man City star now faces a potential six-match ban, as per the Mirror, which would see him miss the trip to Anfield in November.
It’d be a huge blow for City, as the midfielder was clearly one of their most dangerous players last season as they swept up all the available domestic honours.
As per the same report, Silva has since written a letter of apology to the FA – something which Mendy has contributed to by supporting his team-mate.
Opinion
I’m not saying this because it’ll see the lad miss the game at Anfield, I think that should be clear, but Silva needs to be made an example of here.
While it may be something he and Mendy feel comfortable joking about, it’s not something that they should then share with others on social media.
Professional footballers have an incredible audience, and some of those people are impressionable – a young white lad may think it’s okay to joke about his black friend’s skin colour because of Silva’s behaviour.
Do I think Silva is actually racist? No.
Do I think he made a few jokes in public that were ignorant and inappropriate? Yes.