SPYGATE SPECIAL | The Full Impact of Southampton’s Playoff Disqualification

0:00Bonus episode alert, Charlie. Ding, ding, ding. And a first, a first for us. I'm not, who is it a bonus for? Is it a bonus for listeners or is it a bonus for me to see my fellow Charlie and his burgeoning Norwegian ski jumper ginger beard, which is emerging at the moment? Yeah, well, it's a bonus for all of us, isn't it? I know I said a little bit more pronounced on a video, so I may need to get that sorted out. But it's quite nice doing a show that isn't under bright lights so that I'm not looking the most pale that I could look against someone of your nice tan complexion. Anyway, why are we doing this?

0:36Well, we're doing this obviously because of Spygate and the recent developments in the case, which, Charlie, when we recorded our show this week on Tuesday, was very much underdeveloped from the information that we have now. And we didn't really feel capable of talking about this at length without that information, knowing that it was going to release on Friday. So this provides the perfect opportunity to take a look at what's been happening over the last few days. Because I don't know about you, but my phone has been going off and the amount of people going, I can't wait to hear your thoughts on Spygate, has made me think we have to do this.

1:06Yeah, absolutely. It's been a seriously hot topic of conversation amongst, like, a lot of my friends are like you, really Premier League fans, who only really pay attention to what's happening in the Premier League. And I guess probably where the crossover here is, this relates to the playoff final, which determines who goes into the Premier League. But nonetheless, it is still fundamentally an EFL matter. And what's been interesting to me is I've had loads of friends of mine who are EPL club fans getting in touch with their views on this particular thing. I have to say, in most cases, I don't really agree with them.

1:42But there we are. Look, I want to get into that. I want to get into why you don't agree with them. But first, there were a few things that were confusing me. And it's worth just for a minute or so probably explaining to anyone that hasn't been fully aware what's been happening. Because it's probably one of the biggest stories in the EFL's history. And the two teams in one of the championship playoff finals, Southampton and Middlesbrough, were caught up on this when Southampton sent a data analyst intern to go and record a training session or multiple training sessions, if you believe some of the WhatsApp messages, of Middlesbrough before, I think it was the first leg, wasn't it?

2:22It was the first leg of the playoff semifinal. Anyway, this guy was caught on camera filming. And if you want to go and see quite an entertaining cat and mouse chase as he made his way through the golf club, putting on a different disguise in the changing room and shooting out the back to the local town, Sky Sports have done quite a good reenactment of this. Either way, this is an illegal act in the articles of the EFL. It has been, I think it's Article Regulation 127, which was put in after Leeds United were caught doing a similar thing in 2019, where they sent someone to go and have a look at a Derby County training session in a January of a standard season.

2:59And they were fined£200 ,000 for that at the time. And then this regulation was put in place. So since then, this has now become a specific offence against the rules of the league. Anyway, the Championship playoff semifinals went on. Southampton, unfortunately for the EFL, beat Middlesbrough in those and were due to play the playoff final on Saturday. and in quite an incredible turn of events at the independent hearing on Tuesday, which was taking a look at the case and deciding how to punish Southampton, who have not denied the allegations, the commission kicked Southampton out of the playoff final and reinstated Middlesbrough.

3:34And even better, Charlie, I think the other reason we wanted to do this today in particular is last night, we got the confirmation that the appeal Southampton had lodged against that decision has been rejected by the EFL, meaning Middlesbrough will play Hull City on Saturday in the playoff final. A couple of things I was confused about, I'd love your thoughts on. When it came down to that hearing, the EFL and Southampton were the two parties involved in it. So Southampton were the defendant and the EFL were the prosecutor, but Borough were very upset that they weren't involved in it. They thought that they had a right based on the infringements taking place against them.

4:09That confused me firstly, just because I don't understand why the team that have this act against them can't then be a part of that and most importantly couldn't have appealed had the decision gone against them which i think is key because southampton could have appealed so that that is a first point i was just interested on your thoughts on that um well i mean that's totally basic just following of the normal justice procedure so for instance you know if you just take it out of football go into normal life um i'm walking down the street some guy comes along he nicks my phone um i report it to the police the police interview me the police take all the evidence that I've got, you know, to give, and then they put it to the Crown Prosecution Service, and the Crown Prosecution Service decides whether the prosecutor then conducts the prosecution.

4:54I'm not then invited back in to give a further opinion on the matter. I mean, I might be interviewed by a barrister as a witness, maybe, could be, but I don't get the chance to sort of say, oh, I don't think you did a very good job there. I think you need to go back and ask the same questions again or whatever. But it's not the way it works, right? So it's absolutely clear, as somebody who's been multiple times an EFL club director, if you have a complaint against another club, you file that complaint, you give your evidence to support that complaint, and the EFL, in this case, then takes that on.

5:29And I can tell you, I'm involved in one of these right at the moment with a non-league club that I'm a director of, Walton Hirsham. We are complaining about our former manager, who's now at Yeovil Town, tapping up our players while they were still under contract at Walton and Horsham. And these things are often quite hard to prove. In this case, it's actually a photograph of him coming to our end of season celebration party, uninvited, and then speaking to the players in question. But, you know, however open and shut we might feel the case is, the bottom line is we have to present the evidence that we have to the Football Association in this case.

6:06and the Football Association then has to decide, first of all, whether to charge Yeovil Town and then how to do so and go about it. And that's just the way it goes. It's totally and utterly normal. This is how it should be. So first of all, you know, I'm sure that Borough aren't complaining today, right? But in as much as they ever had a leg to stand on, it was a wooden leg. They didn't have a leg to stand on. No, they should not have been involved beyond the initial complaint. Should we evaluate what the outcome of the actual decision is? Because it is absolutely massive So the punishment laid out to Southampton of being kicked out of the playoff final means that they'll miss out on the chance to get to the Premier League which as we know is for three years really over£200 million worth of TV money They've also been given a four-point deduction next season So a significant punishment What do you think about the punishment that's been laid out?

6:57So I'm hearing words in the media from people who should know better are like unprecedented. Well, a youngster like you might not know the history, but those of us who've been around a little longer certainly do. This is not the first time the EFL has kicked a club out of the playoff final. In fact, the last time they did it, they did it after a club had won the playoff final, right? So I'm going to come on to Southampton's words on this in a moment, but Southampton basically are being denied the opportunity, 50-50 opportunity to access the Premier League. When Swindon Town were found guilty of financial infringements in 1990, they had already won the playoff final against Sunderland and they were effectively already promoted.

7:42And then they were not just stripped of that, they were relegated to the division below that. Now, as it happens on appeal, on an opinion appeal, they got reinstated back up into what's now the championship. It wasn't called that at the time. It was Division II because we were still pre-Premier League days. But it's worth bearing in mind that their chairman got sent to prison.

8:07Their chairman got sent to prison. Lou Macari was up in court. The whole thing was absolutely mega. So when people talk about this being unprecedented, it's not. There was a bigger case that happened 30 years ago, which was more dramatic than this. And it all adds up to the same thing, which is that when you enter a competition, you do so based on the rulebook. And you sign a document saying, I accept the rulebook. I have entered this competition and I accept the rulebook. And once you've accepted the rulebook, that's it. From that moment on, if you break the rulebook, then effectively you delegate the judgment as to what your punishment might be to the competition organizers.

8:49People often speak of the EFL as being a regulator. It's not. It's a competition organizer. That's what it is. And to make that competition work, all the participants in the competition have to accept that that rulebook is absolutely sacrosanct. Now, I've heard from a few friends who aren't professionally involved in the industry and even people who are sort of quite hot football fans. Yeah, but is this really such a big offense? Absolutely, yes. It is a massive offence, which is why the EFL changed their rulebook after the Leeds United affair, because they found out, to their horror, that barring a rather broad commitment to act, this is EFL regulation 3.4, which requires clubs to act towards each other in good faith, which is a rather sort of vague catch-all thing.

9:38That's what they did Leeds United under. But that's not specific enough to really land on a club with full force. And that's why they created EFL regulation 127, was specifically because they found out and were then advised by their legal advisors. Look, your rule book currently doesn't, it's not specific enough, right? You've got, if you want to stop that behavior, you have to specifically state that that behavior is not on. So let's just read out what that rule says. EFL regulation 127 prohibits any club from observing or attempting to observe another club's training session within 72 hours of a scheduled match between those two clubs.

10:21Right? It could not be clearer. It could not be clearer. Now, the reason for this 72-hour rule is because of the rhythm and sort of the way in which a club's training schedule will work. So typically, if you have a match on Saturday or Sunday, the match day minus two or sometimes match day minus three, hence the 72 hours, et cetera, is what the coach will call his tactical training session. So that is the training session when the entire intended starting 11 will line up and either those first team squad members who are not playing or the club's under 21 team will then be put into the formation that that manager expects the opposition to use and they will then walk through the whole tactical plan for that particular match somebody said to me this week yeah but surely like you know saints know um what bar what sort of system borough play yeah but that's that's just a generalization the system it's the tweaks it's the little moments and nuances within the system where they've spotted something about how Borough, how in this case, how Southampton play and the Middlesbrough managers saying, right, within my formation, I now want you to position yourself five yards further right.

11:35So I want to block off that inverted run that comes off that wing. Hang on a second. I've spotted that when one of their centre backs steps out, quite often the other one doesn't step out with him. That offers a chance were running behind. So let's rehearse that. That's what happens in this training session. And that is what was the intent in recording that training session was to try and find out the special little plans that Burrow were working on to try and help them against Southampton. So Southampton were deliberately cheating. And there's no other way around it. You've used the word they're deliberate, right?

12:10And that to me is where everyone who comes at it going, is it that bad an offence? Just falls down. This was so premeditated, so planned, and they're strategically planned to the extent where the day they decided to do it was specifically the day you've told me that sometimes NEDs weren't even allowed to come and view training sessions. People directly working for the clubs weren't allowed to be there. 100 % Charlie. I would be told, and this is not by one manager, this is by pretty much every single manager that I've ever worked with. in various of our commercial agreements, there'll be, you know, well, in return for your sponsorship, you can come and watch six training sessions a year with certain guests and all this type of stuff.

12:48And I'd always speak to the football department and the football department tell me, that's absolutely fine, Charlie, but not on Thursdays, right? Never on Thursdays. That training session is sacrosanct. Even people inside the club are not allowed to come and watch that particular training session. That is where the magic happens. That's where the manager makes It's his biggest single difference. That is, if you were to say to a manager, of all the things that you do in the entire week, what is the single most important thing you do? He will tell you the Thursday training session, almost without fail.

13:18Almost without fail. That's where the real work is done. So deliberate in nature. And as you've told me before, I know you nearly fell foul of it at Sunderland. People get kicked out. Teams get kicked out of competitions for relatively, should we say, innocent mistakes where they field an ineligible player in a cup competition and he plays for the final five minutes of a game and then they're kicked out. This happens every year, Charlie, right? So it's a fun story because it ended up being quite dramatic in a way, right? So this is going back a few years. I was at Sunderland and we were playing in the EFL Trophy.

13:54And it's probably fair to say that in the group stages of the EFL Trophy, it's not the most important match that you're going to play in any season. And it's quite often a match where various young players are given opportunities, maybe some players who aren't currently getting first team action or whatever it might be. And that might include some players who've been brought to the club on loan relatively recently because these group matches happen often in September and October, just after the end of the transfer window. So quite often what you'll find is player comes in on loan, isn't getting much match time.

14:26And then the manager says, I'm going to give him a few minutes in the EFL trophy next week. OK, right. So we're playing. I think it was away at Rochdale in the pizza trophy because it was sponsored by Papa John's, I think, at the time. And I think it was away at Rochdale. And the team sheet was submitted. I wasn't there. And I had a call from our head of communications. I had PR guy, Oscar Chamberlain, said, I've just got the team sheet. I'm pretty sure that one of our players on that team sheet is cup tied. I think he played this competition. He played one match or a few minutes in this competition in August or something for his home club or whatever it might be.

15:04So anyway, I said, right, go and get them before it gets in front of the referee. Because the moment your team is declared to the referee, then that is your team. So I've been scurrying down to try. Now, and we rescued the situation. I say we, I had nothing to do with it. Oscar rescued the situation. and the long and short of it is is that we ended up going all the way we ended up, if he hadn't spotted that if he hadn't spotted that mistake we would have forfeited that match, we would not have got through to the next stage and we wouldn't have ended up at Wembley, right this is normal when you sign up to a rule book you fully accept that there are consequences that come with breaking the rule book.

15:53And that would have been a totally unintentional, you know, minor infringement with no intent to try and gain an unfair advantage. Because what you have to think about, Charlie, I'm just going to sort of just finish on this thought and then hand back over to you is, if breaking rules, and particularly intentionally breaking rules, is not subject to severe punishment, what happens next? Where does that go? So let's just say, for instance, that the punishment for this rule breach, which is spying on clubs' training games, is actually a£300 ,000 fine, £400 ,000 fine. Maybe even a two-point deduction the following season, whatever it might be.

16:38What question mark does that put in other clubs' heads? Yeah. Might be worth it. Charlie, you know, that's why everyone says throw the rule book at them. And I'm not saying in this case, But when, you know, that whole phrase comes about from people saying when there's an injustice or a breaking of a rule like this, you have to make an example. And, you know, you mentioned their points difference and financial. Like if they, let's say they didn't kick them out, the two other options could have been those two things. Now, if they'd done a financial penalty of 300 ,000 and Southampton get promoted, you know, that's a drop in the water of the 200 million windfall they're going to get from Premier League revenue over the next three years just from the media.

17:10Secondly, a points deduction. The Premier League and the EFL, that would have been a separate regulatory discussion because the Premier League don't enforce necessarily the points deductions that an EFL would impose. So they'd have to have an agreement there where they said, well, moving into a different competition. There wasn't a clean punishment other than a complete breach of that rule, fully intentional, absolutely deliberate. And Charlie, most importantly, not the first time they'd done it this season. They sent a spy to Oxford United before the game earlier in the season. to watch the training sessions.

17:41Now, Oxford really showed them how that was done, beating them 2-1 in the game. So that didn't exactly work well. And then in April, I think they did the same to Ipswich. And that game ended 2-2. So it's quite interesting that he persevered with this strategy. Tonda Eckhart, I'm saying here, which is the manager of Southampton, persevered with this strategy of sending analysts to go and look at training sessions when it didn't actually throw up great results for them. The premeditation there saw that in the Ipswich game, I think it involved the data analyst dressing in an Eastley kit as a disguise, because Eastley play in similar ground, I think maybe even the same complex as where Ipswich trained.

18:19So you just start thinking about the amount of thought that has gone into this. And his defense was, I didn't know this wasn't allowed, reportedly. That was the defense that was given. So it's the ignorance card, which, as we know, is not a defense. Now, that's unfortunate if you didn't know that, but you can't use that as a defence here. It's actually not a defence at all. So I just want to read out what Phil Parsons, the chief executive of Southampton, has said. And by the way, somebody who I absolutely respect and I think is actually a very good CEO. Agreed, yeah. So Phil said, we are sorry to the clubs involved and most of all to the Southampton fans.

19:01That's fair enough. You know, that's correct. because, you know, yes, absolutely, the clubs have been wronged, the other clubs, that is. But it's fair also to point out that, you know, the Southampton fans have been spending a lot of money travelling home and away supporting that club and effectively all of their hopes and dreams have been dashed on effectively something which they, you know, would have had no part in and wouldn't have supported. He then goes on to say, more interestingly, we believe the financial consequence of yesterday's ruling makes it by a very considerable distance the largest penalty ever imposed on the English club.

19:37Now, I totally understand why he's trying to make that point. You have to try and, you know, as in poker, you have to try and do the best you can with the hand you're dealt. But it is not to put too fine a point on it. Bullshit, right? Which is, first of all, I'd like to point out, they have not been promoted as Swindon Town have been all those years ago. They are in the final. and therefore the punishment that's been given them might either be the largest or maybe the smallest. Because if they had actually lost the game this weekend and been kicked out of the playoffs, then they're not really giving anything up really in financial terms.

20:16Okay, there's a small points deduction next season, but then we've had teams getting handed points deductions this season for tiny infractions of spending rules in this time. I mean, in West Brom's case, a tiny, tiny infraction. So really, I don't think it's up to the EFL to assess the financial consequence of punishments it hands out. Because let's just think about this financial consequence as well. There's a lot of lazy thinking around what this means financially, winning the playoff final. Oh, you get 110 million quid. It's the richest game in football. So are we imagining that 110 million quid gets stuck in the club's bank account, that you just sit on it and it's just like pure, it's like prize money, right?

21:00It's like prize money for a tennis player. It just sits there. Far from it. All of that money would be flowing straight out the other side into wages and transfer fees for new players. So in actual fact, the people who have been most significantly financially affected by this are actually, Charlie, who? Players. Players. The players are the ones who have been most financially punished by this. Because what you'll find in their contracts is that they've all got very significant salary differentials compared whether they're in the championship or in the Premier League. I mean, by significant, I mean, really, really significant.

21:39So I think, you know, I saw last night that some of the players are apparently, you know, considering their options, right, in terms of what's happened here. Well, I get that. But what Phil's saying here is I think, you know, is specious. I get why he's saying this and I respect his position. I do. and I think overall his statement had about the right sort of tone about it, right? But this particular point, I think, you can't be saying to the EFL that every time they make a decision about one of their member clubs, they have to try and parse and get financial analysis on, well, what would this actually mean for this particular club?

22:11That then basically means that you would give much milder punishments to clubs in the championship where the financial consequences are higher and then much more severe punishments to clubs in League Two where the financial consequences are lower. But I mean, it's just absolute rubbish. It's massive for the players, but the fans, I mean, my God, if I was a fan of that club, I would be absolutely devastated. And you look at who's been responsible for this. You know, I think it's safe to lay this very firmly at the kind of, should we say, collective management table. The players, fans, the ownership, even, you know, a couple of the ownership, really good people, good owners, Phil Parsons, by all understanding, very good chief executive.

22:47Now, we can never say who did and didn't know what, but it looks firmly like this has come from the management side and everyone else is having to deal with the fallout. Now, really, just looking at the fans, I was thinking... There's no chance the boardroom knew about this. You can't eat that, yeah. No chance. So, yeah. So, you know, but the fans, you know, you've got a day like this coming up at Wembley. You've got a playoff final. Everyone's bought their hotels. They've got their tickets. They've got their travel. You've probably got kids in there who, you know, going to Wembley for the first time and experiencing the most incredible game and then in the most cruel way to the fans, you get that completely stripped away from you.

23:23You've got non-refundable hotels, I'm sure, for the majority of the time. Then, you know, they are the people very... There might be a market for those rooms on the... You'd think so, wouldn't you? On the inset from people coming from the northeast who might be more in the hotel room than people coming from an hour and a half away in Southampton. The point is that the impact of something like this is significant. But also, this is where I wanted to have your thoughts, because the impact on Hull City on the other side, from having prepared or begun to prepare for a game of this magnitude against Southampton for a number of days, to then have the opponent also changed at a late notice.

24:02I mean, really only confirmed last night, because that was when the appeal was sent through, last night being Wednesday night this week. That has a significant impact. There is an impact of this on Hull. And my question, really, that has been running around this morning, I've seen, but it's been the obvious one, is surely if Southampton are kicked out, they forfeit the final that they're in. Middlesbrough lost, right? So Southampton forfeit the final. You don't reinstate the team that was beaten. And Hull City go up automatically. Sorry, is that something you actually believe? I'm asking a question because that's what I've heard this morning.

24:34Sorry, I thought you were proffering an opinion. No, no, I've heard it this morning. And it's another discussion to have because Hull reportedly are exploring their legal options. Yeah, well, I take what that bloke says, the Hull owner with a pinch of salt. Southampton gained an unfair advantage in a match against Borough. So effectively what you'd be doing, if I was regulating this, is I would say, right, the match which they did that for, which was the first leg, that is then awarded 3-0 to Middlesbrough, which would be the usual practice in these situations, the 3-0 award, okay? So if you go back to the discussions I was talking about, fielding ineligible players and that stuff, it's not a forfeiting the game, 3-0 award, okay?

25:17So then effectively you say that Middlesbrough won that first game 3-0 because Southampton tried to cheat in that first game. And then what happened at Southampton happened at Southampton, okay? Right, so overall, Borough go through. Now, if this is solely related to matches during the main season, right? Then there might have been an argument for saying, well, hang on a second. Who was it who finished one place outside the playoffs? Right? Because if Southampton have been getting an unfair advantage during the main season, then the club that I think has the greatest grounds for complaint is the club that finished one place outside the playoffs.