Gary Neville has launched a stinging attack on Manchester United's CEO of media, Phil Lynch, after footage appeared on Twitter of him explaining how the club works with players on social media.
Neville accused Lynch of 'creating robots on and off the pitch' and claimed 'he makes controlling fans sound like he's trying to win a general election' in response to the footage of him talking to Sports Pro Influencers.
United media chief Lynch says in the short clip: 'Each one of these players are individuals. Some want charity focus, some want family focus, some want just football focus and I think it's really about trying to understand what narrative they want to tell and then we're here to support that narrative.
Manchester United's CEO of media, Phil Lynch, has opened on methods the club uses with players on social media
Gary Neville was left unimpressed by what he heard, telling Lynch to 'get the f@@k away'
'It does get a little tricky sometimes. There's a lot of the mass media out there, trying to build that story, trying to build that tabloid piece of content. That's not what we do at all.
'We're trying to work with them and understand the story they want to get out and we support that, join forces on that.
'We pull, twice a day, fan sentiment graphs for every one of our players. We have certain thresholds that alert us when we see fan sentiment going one way - be that a personal issue, an on-pitch performance issue and when that happens, we then start to work with the player and his team individually to try and counter that narrative a little bit.
'In a lot of cases it is just emotion and it comes off and it calms down anyway. But we do spent a lot of time on what we call social media monitoring and tracking and then working specifically with each individual player but it's 25 bespoke processes. It's not "hey, here's the gameplan and it's going to work for all of you"'.
Neville, in full, quote retweeted the clip saying: 'Creating Robots on and off the pitch! Get the f@@k away from them.
'It's a football club. He makes controlling fans sound like he's trying to win a general election!'.
It isn't the first time Neville has criticised how players have their social media managed.
Lynch said United use monitory methods to identify when fan opinion changes around players
United lost 2-0 at Old Trafford against rivals Man City in the Premier League on Saturday
Back in March, he criticised the England squad for not sounding authentic on Twitter when a number of them posted a near-identical messages saying 'job done' after beating Albania.
'Reading some of the England players tweets last night. Do any of the lads post themselves? They don't sound authentic,' Neville tweeted.
'It's a real shame they don't manage their personal connection to the fans and media. #independentthinkers.'
United are reeling after a 2-0 defeat by rivals Manchester City at Old Trafford in the Premier League on Saturday.