CanadaSaint

I don't think the EFL can set itself up to operate outside the regular UK legal system, but some of the legal minds on here can answer that. If they can't, the EFL has huge legal exposure, not just us.

Given the damage that will result from this, and we're just starting to imagine it, I don't think the club has any choice but to exhaust all avenues of appeal, including the courts. This could go on for quite a while, but what is there to lose?

I'm as angry and embarrassed as most about the club's mindless stupidity, but I don't see some of today's revelations about other instances of our "spying" making it worse unless the new instances also infringed to 72-hour rule, and I've seen no evidence of that. Those allegations are now coming out months after the fact. Seriously? We've screwed up royally and need to admit it, but self-flagellation when the spying was legal is ridiculous. It's just doing what the sensationalist journos have done in their quest to make this issue even bigger than it already is. It seems like the committee bought into that as well.

The balanced perspective will only come out with time: Comparing the Leeds punishment with ours, admissions that “spying” is widespread, the lunacy of spying being completely okay but a capital offence inside the 72-hour window – and not an offence at any time in the Shangri-La Premier League, and English football’s pitiful inability to address its real cancer – financial fair play. Today's ruling punishes spying inside the window on a far higher plane than the sins that are actually killing the game. I suspect that today’s contempt for us will diminish when people have a chance to ponder on all those realities, and eventually conclude that the punishment was ludicrously excessive. But that’s outside our control and won’t change today’s reality. What’s inside our control is demanding that those responsible are kicked into orbit, regardless of who they are. They have given our 141 year-old club the most shameful day in its history. I feel most sick for you folks who buy season tickets, for the players, and for all the people who work at the club but had nothing at all to do with this. And I can’t help thinking of Markus.

For it to carry any weight it wouldn't just need to be irrefutable evidence of spying, but evidence that it was inside the 72-hour window. Otherwise it's just shit thrown at the wall.

Despite the hatred coming from the Boro fans, I think it’s time for us to take the high road. Perhaps everyone at Wembley could send them a picture from sunny Wembley, inscribed with the words: Che sera, sera Whatever will be, will be A postcard to you from me Che sera, sera

Mental. That presupposes that they would have beaten Hull. The most they could claim is their share of the gate receipts and TV money from the playoff final, less their expenses for getting there - which they didn't and won't. They have less chance of winning that case than I do of being the next Pope, and I'm not Catholic. #Delusiononsteroids

It would probably be a straight suspension, not just a touchline ban. But I’m sure the club would have prepared for that outcome. It might start with an injunction seeking a delay in the ban until after Saturday, on the grounds that the removal of Tonda so soon before the final places Saints at an extreme disadvantage. Far more so than an intern with a cell phone spying illegally on a training session.

When you said “Think like a lawyer” I assumed you were referring to Boro’s supposed financial loss, for which they will doubtless pursue compensation. That’s separate to the disciplinary issue, in which they are not involved, and my argument is that they can’t prove any.

Those are citable reasons for them missing out. Your turn. Produce one citable example of how the alleged spying caused them to lose. Not some wild and unprovable assumption.

Absolutely. They’re looking for someone to blame but they should be looking in the mirror. They were the ones who missed the chances, not us or William Salt or Tonda. And they were the ones who hired a coach who had them playing an aggressive, hard press that they weren’t fit enough to sustain. In fact, this is probably why they shit the bed on the run-in. So they were the ones who threw away their auto place. They shouldn’t have needed the playoffs. Orchestrators of their own misfortune. Cry me a river.

It has been my concern all along that, with this becoming a very public fiasco (it’s being covered globally), the football hierarchy would step in. The EFL is under the FA, and the FA is under FIFA. The danger, obviously, is that FIFA would push for the kind of punishment they imposed on the Canadian women’s team – a six-point deduction and a one-year ban for the head coach. Their problem, though, is that spying, in and of itself, is not illegal in the EFL – just inside the 72-hour window; the silence from all the other Championship teams is very telling, and I’m sure that FIFA, the FA and the EFL know why none are speaking up. It’s not illegal at all in the PL. The whole “spying” issue (such an emotive word) is a can of worms, and they’d probably be better off taking it out of the rule book and leaving clubs to protect themselves, just as we do at Stapelwood. I'm fairly confident that removing Saints from the playoff final is off the table – not so much because they view it as an unreasonable punishment (although it would be ludicrously excessive IMO, given how they handled Leeds), but an impractical one that could well trigger a lengthy legal gong show and - possibly - huge financial consequences. This isn't the once-every-four-years Olympics - it's a multi-billion pound commercial enterprise. Given the media furore, I can see them hammering us financially, imposing a points penalty, and banning the person who is ultimately responsible for Salt being there at that time, which could well be Tonda. We’ll appeal, and the appeal process will play out after that. This would effectively "kick the can down the road" to a time when the media's looking at something else, and more balanced thinking can prevail. Caveat: We don’t know what Saints may have that could undermine or mitigate the case against them.

It wouldn’t surprise me if the EFL top brass is wondering if they would be better without ANY rule on spying. The Leeds affair caught them unprepared, so they fudged a solution. Then they created a rule that effectively made it possible for spying to be either legal or illegal, but didn’t specify any punishment, so they’ve been caught unprepared again. All the while, this would be a non-issue in the PL, and other Championship teams are conspicuously silent because (in all likelihood) they’re spying regularly. And Boro are stoking a media frenzy that’s making the EFL look silly. It might not impact their decision in Saints case, but it could also cause them to lean towards leniency because they’re probably going to ditch the rule at some point.

Boro’s is at 120 and clearly gathering momentum - with this nugget of well informed legalese from SmoggyParmo: “I'm just clutching at straws and sharing rumours I stumble across on tw@tter”

There may be a sequel to this sorry saga - Gibson v Solak, in a tantrum, attempted shake-down court case. I don't think Gibson knows who he'd be screwing with. 😂

The twisted knickers suggest that they were relying heavily on being able to introduce 'evidence' that we have done this on multiple occasions. The committee will not be hearing that evidence. And, even if they were, they would want proof that it crossed the line from legal scouting into into spying. The most relevant past behaviour is Gibson's - trying to exploit a rule infraction for personal financial gain.

Yes, and they probably will. But the horse will be out of the stable and many fields away, and nobody (other than them) will care. If Saints appeal, it could stop the horse from going anywhere until things are resolved, and there will be a mayhem of uncertainty.

All the focus thus far has been on Boro’s perspective and Saints’ perspective, but the only important perspective right now is the EFL’s. They have to consider conduct that, of itself, is LEGAL (and practiced by many clubs) – unless it takes place outside a time window. That’s arguably the biggest conundrum they face – all the more so if, as I understand things, what’s illegal in the EFL is not illegal in the PL. So, what are they looking to achieve? They need to find a punishment that: Is proportional: As I posted earlier, the conduct cannot go from “legal” to “a capital offence” just with the tick of a clock. Removing a team from a competition, suspending a coach, or implementing a points deduction (especially one that would carry into the PL) would be excessive punishment, given the “legal, unless” nature of the conduct. Is legally upholdable: It must be reasonable enough to survive a court challenge - especially one that could take months or even years to resolve. Does not create major logistical issues: They must avoid any penalty that creates uncertainty about who plays at Wembley, and – potentially – which team plays in the PL next season; that would be a nightmare scenario. Serves as an enforceable precedent for the future: They need to clarify what happens to clubs that breach this regulation, just in case they need to address this again – whether it impacts a playoff final or a regular season match. The reality is that the EFL’s “path of least resistance” is a substantial fine and nothing more. That certainly won’t satisfy Boro, and they will carry on fuelling the media frenzy. But, even if we were guilty of the offence, the reality is that Boro created their own vulnerability by not taking adequate measures to protect privacy at their training facility, as most clubs have.

The writing was on the wall after about an hour of the game up there. They demolished us with a multi-player, highly intense version of Pochettino-ball. We couldn’t get out of our own half. But they didn’t score and then they ran out of gas, and everything changed. They were never going to recover in time to do it again three days later. This is probably why they lost momentum after Hellberg took over. They weren’t fit enough to play his style, and we know how hard it is to improve fitness mid-season. So, they didn’t lose because of some minor spying shit within 72 hours of the game. They lost because they weren’t good enough to win. #truth hurts

Thanks so much for this excellent post. I have a question about the quoted part because I'm not sure that just a fine for a well-funded club is going to be seen as an adequate punishment. This has turned into a very widely publicized topic, and it now arguably has a larger context than just Boro and Saints. This could move it beyond just the EFL ("Deviation from Established League Precedent") and into the wider football governance arena. As I understand it, the EFL is under the broader jurisdiction of the FA, which itself is under the overall jurisdiction of FIFA. It was FIFA that imposed the one-year ban on Bev Priestman, the Canadian women's team head coach. What are your thoughts on the position that Saints could take in the event that the disciplinary committee seeks to invoke that precedent? It seems to me that Saints definitely need to have their arguments ready for such an eventuality.

I agree with this - and I’m big on getting the ball forward quickly and using both touchlines in our attacking play. We don’t do it to the point of self destruction, like Russball. But done well, with the threat of clipped passes out wide, it’s exhausting and soul destroying to counter. It really took the sting out of the heavy press that very nearly killed us up there.

Nobody I’d want in Boro’s box right now more than Cyle Larin.

No Downes, eh? Perhaps the plan is to go at Boro (as they did up there), get a lead (like they should have done), and be ready to play it tighter in the second half. Downes can get excessively fired-up for games like this, and an early yellow could be very damaging.

If Gibson is deliberately fanning the flames by peddling falsehoods to the media, at what point does he contravene 3.4 himself? "In all matters and transactions relating to The League each Club shall behave towards each other Club and The League with the utmost good faith." I'm sure the EFL would like him to STFU while they sort this out.

Not just hysteria but wilful dishonesty. He bangs on about "lacking integrity" and a "systemic problem" but there's absolutely no indication that we've done this repeatedly within 72 hours of a game - that's the ONLY illegal version. It's notable that there hasn't been widespread condemnation from other clubs, and I think that's because most of them (at least, at the higher levels) do this kind of thing themselves - just outside the 72-hour window. If watching opposition training sessions was fundamentally wrong, there wouldn't be a window. And on the topic of the "harm" we supposedly inflicted on Boro, could there have been any if they deleted the footage so that we never had a chance to use it?