Striker Darren Bent says that the racist abuse suffered by the England senior and U21 sides in Spain came as a big shock to him. Bent was one of three players abused during the U21 game on Tuesday.

The frontman told the club site: "Abuse is bad enough at any time but racial abuse is awful and I don't know how the players got through the game in the senior match.

"It must have been so tough for them to try and focus on the football when they were getting that amount of stick.

"In the U21 match I didn't really hear anything when I was playing, I just got on with the game.

"I don't listen to the crowd anyway but Glen Johnson and Carlton Cole told me that things were said when they were running towards the goal or going for a throw-in, which is obviously very disappointing.

"It was a shock because there are a lot of black players in Spain and it's not a country that I would have associated with racist comments.

"I've been to Spain before and never heard anything like the abuse that went on out there this week.

"Italy has had some trouble for ages but not Spain. It just goes to show that the problem is still there.

"I've been to other countries, like Lithuania and the Ukraine and places like that, and there aren't many black people out there and you get racial abuse. But a big country like Spain, with a big football reputation, you just don't expect it."

"We have had the Kick Racism Out of Football campaign in this country for years and it seems to be working.

"We don't really have a racial problem in the game in this country now. You get one or two incidents obviously, but generally we have moved forward a long way from the bad days.

"Other countries now need to run similar campaigns and hopefully they will move forward as well."

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