Former Manchester United defender Scott Wootton has revealed how Sir Alex Ferguson made all the youngsters at the club delete their social media account – and has spoken candidly on the impact abuse on the networks can have on the families of players and managers.

Following the 5-0 defeat to Liverpool, there has been an increase in personal abuse directed at Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, with a section of online supporters who are in the main aligned to Jose Mourinho posting vitriolic statements that go well beyond what is considered palatable.

This followed a campaign of similar abuse directed at United legend Steve Bruce in his final months as manager of his beloved Newcastle.

And Wootton, who now plays at Morecambe, has discussed how much of the abuse those involved in the professional game see.

“People see what they want to see and read what they want to see,” Wootton says. “People focus on what they like and dislike and disregard 95% of the context.”

The defender went on to explain how Ferguson had instructed all the young players at United to delete their accounts on social network sites.

“The reason I left Twitter was because Sir Alex made all the players delete their social media accounts, I think it was Twitter and Facebook at the time,” Wootton recalled, exclusively on Monday evening’s Talking Devils podcast. “I remember having a meeting about people getting pictures with players, and younger players posting pictures from the training ground, things that you see happen now. But Sir Alex had that much authority that he could tell people, players under 23.”

Ferguson told the players : ‘You’re young lads, you’re getting started in the game, why are you posting pictures of the training ground?’

“This was just around the time I made my debut, so he retired not long after. I think there was a bit of it that he was worried the whole world would be able to see the facilities. I remember deleting it and a few of the lads were asking if we should or just change our name on it.”

Wootton has not used Twitter since, but explained how it remains part of what everyone in the game has to deal with.

“You don’t have to have Twitter or Facebook to know what people think of you, especially as a defender, where you receive more abuse than praise,” he said. “But I could always tell. My parents or family or friends would be at a match and I could play well or have an average game, you’d be in the player’s lounge after talking about it normally.”

“And then the next day, I’d speak to family, and I could tell just by the way they’d drop it into conversation, the social media reaction. I could tell from the way they spoke to me that it would have been from a tweet or a post. It affects all the people around you and it can be such a horrible place to be. Football is such a tribal atmosphere, so hostile.”

“People abusing Ole, they don’t have a clue, they don’t know anything about him, they see the black and white of a tweet and take it how they want.”

You can watch the podcast below or listen back to the audio podcast on Apple or your chosen podcast provider :