The niece of Justin Fashanu, the first openly gay soccer player, says she knows of seven gay men playing premiere league football.

In an interview on BBC Radio Five Live, Amal Fashanu spoke about her uncle (pictured), who committed suicide in 1998, eight years after coming out and receiving a bad reaction from football fans.

She said there were several current Premier League footballers who are in the closet. “I actually know myself of seven. I will never, ever share their details,” she said. “I’m not going to out them because I would never do that.”

She added: “You want to be honest, even to help them out, but you just can’t do that. The football world is extremely dark.

“I don’t even want to imagine being a footballer, what it must be like.”

Apart from Justin Fashanu the only other major league footballer to come out was LA Galaxy player Robbie Rogers, who announced that he was gay in 2013 at the same time as telling the world that he was retiring. He returned to the pitch soon after and continues to play.