Arsenal investigating supporter who directed alleged racist abuse at Napoli defender Kalidou Koulibaly

Napoli played in north London on Thursday night, where they were beaten 2-0 by Arsenal in the first leg of their Europa League quarter-final

Arsenal are working to identify the supporter who allegedly directed racist abuse at the Napoli defender Kalidou Koulibaly, after the incident was shared on social media.

Napoli played in north London on Thursday night, where they were beaten 2-0 by Arsenal in the first leg of their Europa League quarter-final.

In a statement, Arsenal said: “We utterly condemn use of any racist language and have launched an investigation to identify the culprit. We operate a zero tolerance approach and anyone behaving like this is not welcome at Arsenal and will be banned from matches.

“We have an extremely diverse community of fans who are all part of the Arsenal family and such incidents are rare at Emirates Stadium. We encourage supporters to report any incidents as they happen to stewards or via our matchday alert service.”

Koulibaly, a Senegalese international, was subjected to monkey chants during Napoli’s defeat by Inter Milan on Boxing Day last year. The San Siro crowd were told several times over the stadium’s public address system to relent but those requests were ignored, as were Napoli’s complaints to the match officials.

After the match against Inter, in which a clearly distressed Koulibaly was later sent off, the defender tweeted: “I’m disappointed by the defeat, but above all at leaving my brothers. But I am proud of the colour of my skin. Proud to be French, Senegalese, Neapolitan: a man.”

This latest investigation is one of several Arsenal have conducted recently. The Crystal Palace forward Wilfried Zaha was also subjected to racist abuse on social media earlier this season following a match between the two teams.

The club is also continuing to investigate an incident of antisemitism directed towards Tottenham supporters during the north London derby in December.