UEFA must throw book at West Ham's Declan Rice after ridiculous tunnel rant

When Declan Rice screamed at Jesus Gil Manzano, “You have probably been f****** paid”, the Spanish referee should have had a reply at the ready.

“Yes, but not nearly f****** enough to have to deal with spoilt professional ­footballers.”

Rice is an engaging, normally humble, down-to-earth ­character. And one hell of a football player. But UEFA must make an ­example of him. As he walked away from Manzano, who had a pretty ­decent game as West Ham ­Uni­ted went out of the Europa League in Frankfurt on ­Thursday, Rice said, “F****** corruption”.

Now, imagine if we suggested on this page that Rice was ­corrupt. That he had tried to throw a game. His lawyers would be at the front door before you could blow a few bubbles. Rightly so.

But Manzano is just expected to take this sort of disrespectful nonsense because it happens in the heat of the moment. Manzano and plenty of other referees have to accept ritual belittlement as part of the gig, it seems.

Rice is far from the only ­high-profile offender. For all their wonderful ­contributions to English ­football, Jurgen Klopp and Pep Guardiola, for example, get away with all sorts of stuff when it comes to ­disrespecting officials.

But this effort from Rice is at the high end of the scale. The allegation is so ridiculous – if only because Manzano actually did not make any outrageously erroneous ­decisions – that some find the incident almost laughable. Sunday league stuff.

But aggressively confronting referees is a shocking example that authorities have to stamp out. In the English club game, ­remember when it was ­supposed to be only the captain who could speak to a referee? That soon came and went.

On countless occasions in the Premier League this season, referees have been