Saints Expelled from Playoffs

[trousers]

[sadoldgit]

Not even removing the 4 point deduction is very harsh, it is liking kicking the living shit out of us and then spitting on the body as they walk away.

Don’t they really think they punished us enough with the expulsion?

[Livewire]

I cannot believe anyone thinks Tonda can stay. For one, he and whoever else was involved will be charged by the FA and likely suspended from football for a period. For another, he is in breach of contract with the club and likely masterminded this spying disaster. If you don't believe me, look up Bev Priestman as a precedent. Not to mention that there are reports about the players maybe suing the club - certainly there may be an argument that the club has been in repudiatory breach of its contract with them, so they are no longer bound by it either. There are lots of dominoes that are yet to fall, and I fear that we will have a squad that will be very thin once the PL-level talent leaves. 

[sadoldgit]

Just now, trousers said:

The modern equivalent of hung, drawn and quartered. 

[LegalEagle]

Just now, trousers said:

Give the FA a list of those involved and sack them/pay them to go asap.

[Saint In Cornwall]

How did the FA investigation into Bielsa go?

[TwoPints]

2 minutes ago, trousers said:

What is there to investigate?  We confessed to everything FFS. 

[S-Clarke]

Just now, TwoPints said:

What is there to investigate?  We confessed to everything FFS. 

This is now about bringing charges to the individuals.

The EFL have punished the fans and players, now the FA will punish the individuals who actually did it.

Feels backwards but there we are.

[TwoPints]

2 minutes ago, S-Clarke said:

This is now about bringing charges to the individuals.

The EFL have punished the fans and players, now the FA will punish the individuals who actually did it.

Feels backwards but there we are.

I appreciate that but it's all there isn't it? Tonda claiming he knew nothing, analysts saying they were bullied into, internal messages etc.  Not sure what more there is to investigate apart from waiting for the final report from the EFL and reading that. 

Edited 1 hour ago by TwoPints
Typo

[trousers]

8 minutes ago, S-Clarke said:

Doesn't this sort of thing go on more than we realise?

What about those leaked teams to the media 24 hours before games, how have they been got hold of? You never hear the same sort of noise around those, just dealt with internally. There are snakes in football and clubs feed info between people all the time, I'm sure of it - just to try and gain a bit extra. Bit of money changing hands here and there for an inside scoop.

But it makes how we approached it even more crazy, a camera behind a tree ffs. We were literally asking to be caught and beaten to a pulp by Steve Gibson.

Yep, for me, the most astonishing / unbelievable thing that could come out of this whole episode is that it turns out that we're the only club that's done this.

There's plenty of anecdotal evidence that suggests it's widespread. Indeed, Parsons alluded to this in his statement yesterday.l when he talked about setting up a "working group" to deal with the matter.

And, yep, I'm convinced Middlesbrough had advanced intel that we'd be up there, hence the ease at which we were 'caught in the act' (not an excuse though, of course)

Edited 1 hour ago by trousers

[S-Clarke]

1 minute ago, TwoPints said:

I appreciate that but it's all there isn't it? Tonda claiming he knew nothing, analysts saying they were bullied into, internal messages etc.  Not sure what more there is to investigate apart from waiting for the final report from the EFL and reading that. 

The EFL can't punish the individuals, but the FA can bring sanctions upon them (such as bans etc). EFL can't do that.

[Lighthouse]

1 minute ago, S-Clarke said:

This is now about bringing charges to the individuals.

The EFL have punished the fans and players, now the FA will punish the individuals who actually did it.

Feels backwards but there we are.

No, the EFL have punished the club. The FA will now look into who was involved individually and look to hand out sanctions accordingly. I don't think this is bad news for Saints as such as those individuals are likely to be sacked very soon anyway. I can't see the club being handed more of a punishment, given what's happened.

[S-Clarke]

1 minute ago, trousers said:

Yep, for me, the most astonishing / unbelievable thing that could come out of this whole episode is that it turns out that we're the only club that's done this.

There's plenty of anecdotal evidence that suggests it's widespread. Indeed, Parsons alluded to this in his statement yesterday.l when he talked about setting up a "working group" to deal with the matter.

And, yep, I'm convinced Middlesbrough had advanced intel that we'd be up there, hence the ease at which we were 'caught in the act' (not an excuse though, of course)

It stinks mate. I feel some sort of stich up, and funnily enough said stitch up has given Boro more of an advantage than we gained.

Obviously that'll never be proven, but it all stinks to me.

[sadoldgit]

I think that this will go down as one of the greatest over reactions and miscarriages of justice in footballing history.

[Osvaldorama]

Just now, sadoldgit said:

I think that this will go down as one of the greatest over reactions and miscarriages of justice in footballing history.

And yet only our lot will actually care. 
 

Just have to suck it up and crack on. 
 

 

[SaintsLoyal]

Resign in shame , get out of my club and back to selling hoovers.

 

 

[M271]

4 minutes ago, trousers said:

If it’s not against the rules in the EPL, is it against the rules in the FA cup? If not then why treat our individuals differently for the same actions that would be ok in the EPL? I know that it is outlier EFL rules broken but it seems double standards if the FA apply actions differently.

[trousers]

5 minutes ago, TwoPints said:

What is there to investigate?  We confessed to everything FFS. 

As far as I'm aware, we've confessed to what we did, not why we did it....? 

Whether the FA will take any mitigation into account ("I didn't know the law existed, m'lud") who knows but, my clutching at straws aside, you're probably right about it being an open-and-shut case.

[Farmer Saint]

1 minute ago, sadoldgit said:

I think that this will go down as one of the greatest over reactions and miscarriages of justice in footballing history.

Agreed. A fucking chap with an iPhone from 150 yards away.

It's fucking mental.

[LegalEagle]

Bend over and accept what is coming. When we win our first 5 games of next season this will get forgotten very quickly.

[Farmer Saint]

In a game where corruption, cheating, diving and financial fraud are commonplace, this is where the EFL and FA take a stand.

It's an absolute joke.

 

[benjii]

1 minute ago, LegalEagle said:

Bend over and accept what is coming. When we win our first 5 games of next season this will get forgotten very quickly.

I like it.

[Ekelund24]

I wonder if the EFL has shot itself in the foot now with enforcing the rulebook to the fullest extent, there are a few rules that teams could report to the EFL and expect enforcement. If Ipswich had missed out on promotion due to the two postponed games against Pompey they could've reported them for Rule 32.3 as the skates could've foreseen rain and protected the pitch. Also, playing a weakened side could result in actions if the other team benefits at the expense of third team potentially getting relegated or missing out on the playoffs.

We broke the rules and admitted to them so had no recourse apart from appealing the severity but we admitted to breaking them on multiple occasions which will always get the harshest punishment.  

 

[Ekelund24]

5 minutes ago, Farmer Saint said:

Agreed. A fucking chap with an iPhone from 150 yards away.

It's fucking mental.

He could've said he was bird watching and then it would've been up to Middlesboro to prove the case.

[trousers]

1 minute ago, Farmer Saint said:

In a game where corruption, cheating, diving and financial fraud are commonplace, this is where the EFL and FA take a stand.

It's an absolute joke.

 

Yep... Alas, the size and stature of our club makes us the ideal fall guy for the authorities... Not too big, not too small....

 

[Mboto Gorge]

26 minutes ago, Farmer Saint said:

Yeah, but your source is made up, we know that.

Dont ever change pal xx

[saintant]

There's some sanctimonious twats all across the media mouthing off about how we're a bunch of cheats. Come on. It's pretty much accepted that every club does this. We just happened to do it at Boro and they decided to make a song and dance about it in the lead up to the play-off semi-final because they saw it as a way to make mischief. Nearly every ex pro has come out and said the gains from doing this are absolutely miniscule. FFS we spied and lost to Oxford, we didn't spy and we beat Arsenal and Fulham.

The press and pundits have acted like a lynch mob in all this which drove the EFL and original hearing panel to a position where they felt they had to impose the maximum punishment. Never mind what the big clubs have got away with and continue to do so. No, let's hammer little old Southampton because that's what everyone wants, we can give the world their pound of flesh, make ourselves look the good guys and they won't fight back.

The whole thing is a joke and I do get that we have brought this on ourselves through stupidity but our football club has been given one of the biggest sanctions in world football for doing something which brought us extremely minimal gains. Sledgehammer to crack a nut x 1 million.

[Lighthouse]

6 minutes ago, Farmer Saint said:

Agreed. A fucking chap with an iPhone from 150 yards away.

It's fucking mental.

You're only writing it like that to try and trivialise what we've done. He was illegally recording the training and tactics of a team we were playing for a place in the PL. They knew it was wrong, they knew we'd get in trouble and they did it anyway. The fact that the bloke was completely incompentent in doing it doesn't make it any more acceptable.

[AlexLaw76]

Just now, saintant said:

 

The whole thing is a joke and I do get that we have brought this on ourselves through stupidity but our football club has been given one of the biggest sanctions in world football for doing something which brought us extremely minimal gains. Sledgehammer to crack a nut x 1 million.

We have been docked 4 points and removed from a knock out competition. All for self confessed cheating, at least multiple times.

We have not been given a fine nor relegated.

 

 

[bpsaint]

21 minutes ago, sadoldgit said:

Not even removing the 4 point deduction is very harsh, it is liking kicking the living shit out of us and then spitting on the body as they walk away.

Don’t they really think they punished us enough with the expulsion?

I guess their argument will be that we could have lost the playoff final, and thus would have escaped punishment essentially.

[Tommy]

Here we go then, FA process now started. Individual bans incoming and we could see points deduction increased

[Patrick Bateman]

Just now, Tommy said:

Here we go then, FA process now started. Individual bans incoming and we could see points deduction increased

No we can't. The club have been sanctioned / punished, this is for individuals.

[AlexLaw76]

Just now, Tommy said:

Here we go then, FA process now started. Individual bans incoming and we could see points deduction increased

what?

[Farmer Saint]

2 minutes ago, Lighthouse said:

You're only writing it like that to try and trivialise what we've done. He was illegally recording the training and tactics of a team we were playing for a place in the PL. They knew it was wrong, they knew we'd get in trouble and they did it anyway. The fact that the bloke was completely incompentent in doing it doesn't make it any more acceptable.

I'm not saying it's acceptable, but it is massively overblown IMO.

[Tommy]

Just now, Patrick Bateman said:

No we can't. The club have been sanctioned / punished, this is for individuals.

The FA can add more points or other sanctions on the club. 

[trousers]

[Hopper]

1 minute ago, trousers said:

If I were Dragan I'd be going scortched earth with the senior management team.

[LegalEagle]

2 minutes ago, trousers said:

Blackmore was on Radio 5 Live this morning talking, in my view, utter rubbish. He was saying we should have put our hands up and been more contrite from the start and we would probably have received a lesser penalty. That’s exactly what we did do in the Boro board room. If we had used the Man City playbook we wouldn’t be in the position we are now. Keep quiet, get the lawyers on board immediately and delay, delay, delay. We played it totally wrong. 

[benjii]

Adam can't risk his summer trip to wherever Dragan is holidaying.

That said, I doubt he knew we were cheating.

[TheSoundman]

6 minutes ago, Tommy said:

The FA can add more points or other sanctions on the club. 

No they can't. It's an EFL competition, hence all the Leicester shenanigans. 

You need to prove that one mate rather than trying to wind people up further 

[benjii]

Just now, LegalEagle said:

Blackmore was on Radio 5 Live this morning talking, in my view, utter rubbish. He was saying we should have put our hands up and been more contrite from the start and we would probably have received a lesser penalty. That’s exactly what we did do in the Boro board room. If we had used the Man City playbook we wouldn’t be in the position we are now. Keep quiet, get the lawyers on board immediately and delay, delay, delay. We played it totally wrong. 

Yeah, he talks a lot of shit.

[westmidlandsaint]

I think the fans need to hear from Dragan. I was expecting to have heard something from club captain Jack Stephens too unless PFA have said not too.

[saintant]

1 hour ago, Shufty Zubrik said:

Whilst accepting the reality of the expulsion, I do think that within a relatively short time the EFL 72 hour rule will be removed. It is a response to a time when Bielsa saw observation as a means to gain intelligence on opponents. Today Wyscout provides all of the data that a coach could need to form an understanding of the opponent. Europe and the EPL have no apparent interest in defining ‘allowed’ observation as most leagues see it as a marginal irrelevance. We may well be the first and last to fall foul of that EPL rule. 

Makes the punishment even more ridiculous if they ditch the 72 hour rule now. Ditching it can only be because they don't think it is necessary. It will also be their way of making sure they don't face a shit show next time someone is caught.

[Oldandtired]

26 minutes ago, S-Clarke said:

It stinks mate. I feel some sort of stich up, and funnily enough said stitch up has given Boro more of an advantage than we gained.

Obviously that'll never be proven, but it all stinks to me.

Collusion between all the powers that be to take the spotlight off Man City...

Edited 46 minutes ago by Oldandtired

[TheSoundman]

1 minute ago, benjii said:

Adam can't risk his summer trip to wherever Dragan is holidaying.

That said, I doubt he knew we were cheating.

I'm not sure Adam should be getting summer trips on the club.

The first line of his post when we were charged was something like 'as an independent observer'. He washed his hands and covered his own self-serving arse as quickly as he could.

[beatlesaint]

I guess everyone who will face FA charges needs to be sacked before it gets to that then the club have been seen to act. Whatever charges those involved face can be for their next employer to suck up…..unless as I suspect they move to a European club etc

[rallyboy]

What a fucking dreadful week - for us and the EFL.

We cheated, we're clearly guilty, we should be punished, sack the manager now.

But let's clarify, there are two different elements here, the guilt and then the punishment.

Because we haven't just been punished, the EFL haven't addressed the guilty parties, they've gone nuclear and totally shafted the whole club, the business, the staff and the fanbase for years to come.

And yes, I fully accept the cheating and the fact that we are guilty, but the punishment is ridiculously out of proportion to any other ever imposed, perhaps bar Luton, while the priority of the Middlesborough-driven EFL board has clearly been getting Middlesborough back in and to fuck over Hull City, who should now be promoted.

                                 But RB, cup competition, reinstated...blah blah blah...

No, no, no, this isn't an ineligible player or a match revisited, the EFL had the charges before the game and said the tie could go ahead, but despite the unusual refereeing they still didn't get the result that the EFL's Steve Gibson wanted so they had to manipulate the situation to reward his club.

It feels like VAR all over again, fucking over small clubs while Man City, Chelsea and Liverpool, all guilty of far worse multiple offences, carry on regardless - football looks fucked today.

Maybe see you in August.

#GoHull ✊

[Osvaldorama]

6 minutes ago, LegalEagle said:

Blackmore was on Radio 5 Live this morning talking, in my view, utter rubbish. He was saying we should have put our hands up and been more contrite from the start and we would probably have received a lesser penalty. That’s exactly what we did do in the Boro board room. If we had used the Man City playbook we wouldn’t be in the position we are now. Keep quiet, get the lawyers on board immediately and delay, delay, delay. We played it totally wrong. 

This is why he’s a journalist and not a successful businessman. 

[Patrick Bateman]

I'd like to hear from Dragan Solak ASAP, not the people under him. 

He has football people in the club he can rely on, Marieanne Spacey-Cale for one! Get Simon Parker in too. I mean the women's team have been decently run - just for a couple of weeks to help steady the football side of things and maybe help advise on who to approach to replace Spors etc? I don't know, but he does have football people in the club to help who aren't tarnished by this crap.

But Parsons, Spors, Tonda downwards should all walk today. 

Edited 42 minutes ago by Patrick Bateman

[Hopper]

On the plus side no VAR next season 😂