Yet in February the board voted, 7-4, to hire Dave Boyle, formerly the chief executive at Supporters’ Direct, at a cost of £900 to look through the fans’ internet forums and report back on posts that could be described as harassment, unjustifiably abusive or potentially libellous from the previous nine months.
The irony is that
Boyle has form himself for offensive use of social media, relinquishing his position at Supporters’ Direct in 2011 because of a series of abusive messages on Twitter that prompted the Premier League to
withdraw its annual £1.2m funding. As if that were not awkward enough, he has also allegedly posted highly offensive comments on the When Saturday Comes message board about supporters on about supporters from one FC forum.