Hashtag United caused a stir on social media earlier this year when they announced the arrival of the world's first artificial intelligence (AI) professional footballers, Holly and Harvey.

Their arrival sparked anger and debate with the original post on X amassing 3.8 million views. Despite their record-breaking move, the pair were sold in historic deals to the Isthmian League Premier Division club, England's seventh-tier club, with the tweet also being viewed three million times.

The Tags have enjoyed a rise through the football pyramid after YouTuber Spencer Owen created the football club, initially with his friends against other creator teams, before the move into the league system.

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The undisclosed fee saw the players move on a month after arriving. In doing so, Hashtag received a five-figure fee for the players - likened to a FA Cup run for non-league clubs - with Owen defending the decision as he responded to the criticism.

"Hashtag has a remit to be innovative and in the conversation, if we can't be in the top level of football, be at the top of the conversation. The signing and subsequent transfer achieved that," he told Mirror Football.

"Theoretically, Hashtag or any player at our level was potentially misconstrued. An AI actor or actress can 100% take a job away with CGI; it is plausible, at this moment in time. An AI footballer can’t take a job; maybe in the future (it can).

"But if you're Liverpool (Football Club), what would be the actual, realistic use of an AI player? You can use them for content, sponsorship purposes, player access is not always there, but they have access to use them for brand activation, content, a club at our level - non league - do not have that.

"It is misinformation to say that a club at our level having an AI football player is taking jobs away, it is actually the opposite: if a club was to do it, theoretically, it would create jobs."

He added: "I think the beauty of social media, sometimes at least, is instant feedback. YouTube is like that a little bit, I was a little bit surprised by how visceral some people’s hate was because I don’t feel that way. I do have concerns about AI but I think it’s the use of that matters.

"The criticism to us was so instant, it certainly didn’t fall on deaf ears and we take things seriously, it wasn’t criticism of our project, it was criticism of the idea because no one really listened to what we were doing.

"The comments are not the entire reaction, you may see something that you love but the chance of you commenting is low but if you don’t like it, the chance of commenting are inherently higher than positive.

"The comments are the extreme reactions, if you look at the amount of shares and likes, it’s not all negative. There’s some people perhaps in the industry, in sport or social media, who were commending us, saying it's genius or whatever; I'm not saying the criticism is wrong - I take it seriously - but it was so instant that it was larger than what we were doing."

Off the pitch, they currently have over 656,000 subscribers on YouTube and boast over 140million views across their 1,050 videos. Hashtag have been a pioneer for football clubs in utilising social media and an online presence in order to grow their club, as well as their brand, in order to obtain sponsorships and brand deals.

But with the success in the commercial department, the Tags are still small fish by comparison to some of the non-league juggernauts in their division for expenditure.

All the while, they have had aspirations to be custodians of their own facility and stadium, having groundshared with a host of clubs since their formation, before entering an agreement at Aveley's Parkside.

As a result, Hashtag's revenue is limited by the incomings split through gate receipts or having to pay rent per month. Diversifying their revenue streams through social media help fund the club with opportunities like the AI professional footballers, allowing for further monetary gains.

Hashtag are happy to test the water and disrupt the norm to try new ideas. Their experiment with AI footballers sparked criticism and the nature of the announcement gathered headlines, but it achieved one of Hashtag's objectives to be at the forefront of the conversation for innovation.

"We have an internal mission to be one of the most innovative football clubs in the world," Owen said.

"The way we can achieve our goals as an organisation, because we are different, we want to lean into that and we don't want to become like other clubs, we respect them and the traditional institutions but we can’t beat them.

"It's impossible, they're entrenched, leagues that are unreachable; they're allowed to lose hundreds of millions a year. I've got no interest in having a club that is viewed as a success for losing a couple hundred million over a few years.

"We play in the seventh division and teams are still losing millions, we have no interest in that; we want to be the best version of ourselves and that's zigging when everyone else zags. We want to lean into using our brand to do things that other clubs want to do but can’t because of certain traditions, too many decision-makers, their fans will react bad to or ones they’ve haven’t thought of and wouldn’t do.

"We have to do that, it's in our identity, when an opportunity comes to you to be in the record books, not once but twice, first club to sign AI players, first club to sell them.

"I think this idea would have been talked about in a lot of football boardrooms, some clubs would have run a million miles, some would have been interested and us doing it has probably put some off because of the reaction. I did expect it but I didn't expect it to be as bad, but I was surprised. I wouldn't change anything because we had a plan to be in the record books twice."