Racist abusers should be punished severely says Chris Wilder

On Monday morning, the Blades shared an image from McGoldrick's Instagram account showing the abuse, with the Blades player writing "2020 and this is life".

The club stated that the situation 'cannot continue' and stressed that 'something needs to change' following a spate of vile messages sent to top-flight players already this season.

The abuse of McGoldrick - who scored his first goals in the Premier League in Saturday's 3-0 victory over Chelsea - followed the arrest of a 12-year-old boy in connection with racist messages sent to Crystal Palace winger Wilfried Zaha on social media.

Wilder said: "The timing of it from a personal point of view for David is incredible. It is incredible these things are still happening."

"I am not the biggest of fans of social media. I understand its importance world-wide, but certainly more has to be done by the people that power these media outlets to work in conjunction with police and authorities and punish heavily these people who feel that they have the right to go online and abuse people in whatever form.

"For people to abuse people in any shape or form is terrible and they should be punished severely."

"The severest of punishments need to be handed out. I am a big believer in education, but there has to be a price to pay for people who do this.

"What I would like to happen is maybe a bit extreme, so I will keep that to myself, but the club put out a statement and hopefully authorities can take it forward from hereon in and deal with it in the best way.

"Knowing the person and what he (McGoldrick) is about, he will be deeply disappointed. He is an intelligent and fabulous footballer and most importantly, he is a great human being to deal with."

Meanwhile, Wilder is hopeful that midfielder John Fleck will be involved in Thursday's encounter with Leicester City.

He said: "We are hopeful John will be involved. He has got a couple of days and a couple of clearance sessions."