The Barrow AFC Board of Directors have become increasingly concerned at the amount of online abuse targeting members of the clubs staff, by a small minority of our fan base.
This is completely unacceptable and unwarranted towards our valued staff, who work each and every day to move our football club forward and such abuse will not be tolerated. The perpetrators will be dealt with swiftly and decisively, so as to ensure our positive momentum over the past five years can continue as a joint effort between supporters, staff, players and owners.
We have been clear from day one of our tenure as owners that everyone is entitled to their own opinion on how the club should be run, demonstrated most by our partnership with the Bluebirds Trust and the election of a fan representative onto the clubs board of directors.
However, there is a line that cannot be crossed and personal and targeted abuse of individual staff who are merely implementing the policies and procedures of the Board is completely abhorrent and asinine.
We therefore re-iterate that any supporters who take part in targeted abuse of our staff, in person or online, will be subject to club bans.
To that end, as a result of the recent abuse that we have observed online, two people have been given club bans and a further individual has been given a final warning.
Following the implementation of the measures outlined above, Chairman Paul Hornby commented:
“The owners of our Club are all locally born and are just trying to help the town and our local communities, so it’s extremely disheartening to see this behaviour.
We will not tolerate any of our staff, who are working incredibly hard to progress the football club, being subject to such unnecessary abuse.
We know the vast majority of our supporters are excellent, so we will not let a small number of people undermine the positive momentum of our football club.”
The club will make no further comment on this matter.