I have a very good friend; he is the highest profile guy in professional football of anyone I know.
Recently he was assistant head coach at Bristol City, Lee Johnson was sacked; and the rumour mill went into overdrive; which lead to our own Steven Gerrard being touted/mentioned/approached through a third party(whichever).
This led most of us, myself included, to the OTIB(One team in Bristol) forum, to see what was being discussed.
As the approach for SG was dismissed PDQ, I kept going back to their thread to see what was being said.
My pal is Dean Holden. He`s done his badges (in Scotland); he`s been LJ`s assistant at Ashton Gate for some time; he`s subsequently been offered and taken the job.
The abuse that was posted about him over 100+ pages before he was offered the post, led me to private message him; and say ffs mate, don`t read the OTIB forum. It was outrageous.
The reply I received was thanks bud, you need thick skin; I don`t go near the forums.
Taking this as (probably) a common approach across the professional game, I`m imagining the likes of FF(and other teams forums)not to mention the media, is exactly what SG means when he speaks of our players `blocking out the noise`.
Of course you can`t control where players go on the internet in their downtime;
; but if you had an instruction from Steven Gerrard
as your boss to `block out the noise` football forums would be a no go.
Sorry to be long winded.