A certain Bobby Zamora has sparked debate about football forums this week. After opening the scoring for Fulham at the weekend, he decided to show his euphoria by proceeding to tell his celebrating supporters to “f*cking shut up”, or words to that effect.

Not your average celebration really is it?

It later transpired that this was aimed at certain Fulham supporters who had been abusing Bobby on the Fulham message board.

So, you can probably see where this is going. And I’m guessing none of you reading this are thinking “ooh, it’s the Brightonfans.com messageboard isn’t it!?!”

Yep, NSC. North Stand Chat. To many, the greatest online Albion website. It sparked Fans United day in 1997, it helped lead the Falmer campaign, it developed the Robert Eaton Memorial Fund charity, it has killed millions of lunch hours at work and has allowed supporters to spend evenings debating their favourite flavour Quiche. Oh, and enjoy pictures of Gemma Atkinson’s breasts. But I digress. To some people, NSC is the worst online Albion site. You see, while it offers Brighton fans a chance to chat virtually from all parts of the world, it also allows the fan to voice an opinion on the football that anyone can read.

It’s all very well giving players petty nicknames (Adam El-Bad? Kevin McLard?), but would you want them to know about it? Unfortunately, many of the players are the same age as NSC contributors. And they no doubt read NSC (and perhaps even post) themselves. God knows what Craig Davies would make of being called “Barndoor” and what Colin Hawkins would think when told the only reason he won’t be getting near the squad during the hectic Christmas period is because he’s playing the Panto Donkey at the Theatre Royal.

You see, it’s great that the supporters can debate opinions, but what isn’t so wonderful is the impact it can have on players, as highlighted by Bobby Z at the weekend.

And that’s why if I was Tony Bloom or Gus Poyet I’d make sure players are banned from NSC. I’m not sure if this can be done in an ethical manner, but you’d like to think there’s a way that NSC can be restricted from footballer’s computers. NSC is great - but not if you’re a player. Because it’s not meant for them. Supporters might be extreme in their opinions sometimes, but I’m almost certain they would rather be proved wrong and look a fool in front of a few hundred computer users than cause a player’s form to go to pieces when they read that a few Albion fans thing that they are an overrared and useless ****.