King of twitter won't be gagged

Rio Ferdinand has vowed to carry on tweeting despite the FA issuing a warning to players of their responsibilities on social media.

Barely a week goes by without some ‘twitter storm’ brewing up with the Manchester United defender in the spotlight after retweeting a message describing Ashley Cole as a choc-ice following the John Terry/Anton Ferdinand court case.

Sir Alex Ferguson has let his players know his contempt for twitter but with over three million followers Ferdinand knows the ways of the world better than most.

“Anyone who says they’re thinking of going on Twitter, I always say ‘You’ve got to have a thick skin’,” the defender revealed. “You’ve got to be able to take abuse. If you can’t take abuse, then it’s not the place for you to be on there.

“You have Liverpool fans, Manchester City fans, obviously now Chelsea fans, who seem to follow me and come on there just to abuse me.

“I’ve said it before, but that kind of stuff is like fuel. You use that stuff, so when you play their team, there’s a little bit more rivalry about the game.”

Ferdinand added: “It’s fun and I treat it as fun. Some people take themselves too seriously on it and they’re the people who are going to get caned by every Tom, Dick and Harry.

“When I was a kid I would love to have been able to be close to people like John Barnes, Gazza and Paul Ince.

“I would love to have just got their autographs, let alone be able to speak to them publicly, so Twitter is something that lets fans get a bit closer to you, letting them see you do everyday things, just giving them a glimpse of what you get up to.

“A lot of fans presume you’re at the opening of a bar, nightclub or a premiere every other night. They don’t realise you’ve got a normal life in most ways.”

Celtic boss Neil Lennon has 134,000 followers on twitter with his recently opened facebook account being liked by 14,000 fans.

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