Saints Expelled from Playoffs

[Osvaldorama]

15 minutes ago, egg said:

It depends on the link, but Saints were a party, Boro weren't. 

But boro were the accuser, the beneficiary and the main instigators. The entire process was of their design 😂

 

Again, it doesn’t excuse us. But if our legal team, club and PR department had anything about them AT ALL they should have been all over this stuff, pushing a narrative of corruption in the media. 
 

Instead they literally bent over and made everything as bad as possible for ourselves 

[Turkish]

Just now, Hopper said:

Even if that were the case it doesn’t change anything.

The narrative would just be that they had suspicions and laid a trap to catch us red handed. We’re still the guilty party.

I'm not sure if people are trying to just balance the wrong doing in their own minds to feel better or what.

Tonda fucked it. We pay the price. Get the man gone, can’t believe we’ve not sacked him yet.

Course is doesn’t we shouldn’t have done it in the first place. However when some people said there were a few things about this that didn’t stack up it was just dismissed as conspiracy theories turns out there might well have been one. 
 

BTW I’m hearing he has gone 

[egg]

Just now, Osvaldorama said:

But boro were the accuser, the beneficiary and the main instigators. The entire process was of their design 😂

Again, it doesn’t excuse us. But if our legal team, club and PR department had anything about them AT ALL they should have been all over this stuff, pushing a narrative of corruption in the media. 

Instead they literally bent over and made everything as bad as possible for ourselves 

You're overthinking the relevance. There is no conflict of interests, and not even a declarable interest imo. BUT, if the club were looking at going further, they'd probably look at the failure to disclose a link (assuming that's the case) but for me it's so distant and remote, it won't get anywhere. 

[AlexLaw76]

7 minutes ago, Turkish said:

 

BTW I’m hearing he has gone 

Source?

[Hopper]

1 minute ago, egg said:

You're overthinking the relevance. There is no conflict of interests, and not even a declarable interest imo. BUT, if the club were looking at going further, they'd probably look at the failure to disclose a link (assuming that's the case) but for me it's so distant and remote, it won't get anywhere. 

That’s also somewhat mitigated by the appeal being upheld by a separate committee who clearly agreed with the first. There were checks and balances in place, if we didn’t get anywhere with the appeal we certainly wouldn’t have more luck going back for a third time.

[Turkish]

1 minute ago, AlexLaw76 said:

Source?

 

Cot WhatsApp group. Have I ever been wrong?

[Turkish]

10 minutes ago, egg said:

If I understand the trapgate theory, people are saying that one Boro lad helped Salt do what he shouldn't have done, and were waiting for him. Is that that it? 

They clearly knew we’d done it before, set a trap to tell Salt where to be and were waiting, yes. 

[egg]

2 minutes ago, AlexLaw76 said:

Source?

The CoT had all seeing eyes. Not as far as Tonda's merry men though. 

[Hopper]

Need to up the CoT’s budget for espionage and travel.

[egg]

Just now, Turkish said:

They clearly knew we’d done it before, set a trap to tell Salt where to be and were waiting, yes. 

So what's the complaint? That's a bit like complaining that a cop was parked around the corner cos he was tipped off about a drink driver by a bloke who'd bought said driver a few beers. 

[Leighsterrr]

10 minutes ago, Hopper said:

Even if that I'm not sure if people are trying to just balance the wrong doing in their own minds to feel better or what.

That's where I am with it, I just don't think I understand (cue Tonda's chant 😬)

a, why we thought it was a good idea

b, what we achieved by it

c, why it's causing such a shit storm

And trying to feel better and convince myself that renewing my season ticket is better than cutting my nose off to spite my face

[ChrisPY]

6 minutes ago, AlexLaw76 said:

Source?

 

8 hours ago, MB said:

Heard he has gone

 

[Turkish]

Just now, egg said:

So what's the complaint? That's a bit like complaining that a cop was parked around the corner cos he was tipped off about a drink driver by a bloke who'd bought said driver a few beers. 

Who’s complaining? I said we shouldn’t have done it and stupidly walked right into it. We got caught, it was a stupid thing to do and Tonda has also been exposed as a bullying prick. It’s just a theory on how it all fell into place 

[Hopper]

1 minute ago, Leighsterrr said:

That's where I am with it, I just don't think I understand (cue Tonda's chant 😬)

a, why we thought it was a good idea

b, what we achieved by it

c, why it's causing such a shit storm

And trying to feel better and convince myself that renewing my season ticket is better than cutting my nose off to spite my face

This will pass and the club will move forward. If this is on Tonda (which at this point seems to be the case) I wouldn’t feel too much guilt about supporting the club. We need to show some balls and move quickly though or it’s gonna be a rough summer.

[Turkish]

9 hours ago, Turkish said:

My sources tell me he’s gone

 

2 minutes ago, ChrisPY said:

 

 

CoT scooped MB by and hour mate 😉

[egg]

2 minutes ago, Turkish said:

Who’s complaining? I said we shouldn’t have done it and stupidly walked right into it. We got caught, it was a stupid thing to do and Tonda has also been exposed as a bullying prick. It’s just a theory on how it all fell into place 

The theory takes us nowhere though and is pointless. Boro were / are cunts, but whether we were baited or not, we bit. 

[Ekelund24]

11 minutes ago, egg said:

Both cases were partly distinguishable from ours. 

The Leeds case wasn't a breach of a 72 hour rule, and wasn't in the play offs. Where I see it's relevance is re next season's points as that penalty related to league game breaches. The panel could reasonably have distinguished Leeds re the Boro game, but points for the other 2 was ott and I'm surprised that wasn't reduced to a Leeds ish fine on appeal. 

That said, the F1 is distinguishable too. That's similar in that it involved attempts to illegally get information to give an unfair sporting advantage, and that the information was used internally for that purpose. BUT in the F1 case, the team were found with 780 pages of Ferrari technical data. 780 pages. That's a world away from the information we had or sought to get...but, the magnitude of the Boro game is massive, so the point would be that even a small amount of data which could give a sporting advantage in that one game, could be significant. 

The main issue for the panel was balancing a proportionate penalty with a meaningful one. A fine ain't a sporting penalty, and wouldn't touch the sides with promotion money anyway. Points in a league that we might not have been involved an for years to come isn't a sporting penalty either. What other sporting penalty did that leave? 

The Leeds one is mainly irrelevant due to the addition of the rule 127, which has clearly been broken and that separates the punishments that can be levied.

The F1 case is strange as the punishment was to the Constructors (McClaren) but the drivers were not punished and allowed to retain their point and compete in the drivers championship even though they would've benefited most from the information gather from the technical information. Using this to justify the commissions result seems to be contradictive as the F1 ruling allowed a sporting advantage for the drivers. 

There are also a couple of NFL cases for spying which resulted in a big fine to the Head Coach and sporting sanctions equivalent to a transfer embargo (Loss of first round Draft Pick) which I thought might be considered in the ruling.

The other thing that jumped out in the report is that Middlesboro were aware of the Oxford spying on the same day as we spied on them which seems a little random unless they were already aware (which may well be stated somewhere else in the 200 odd pages previous)

[Turkish]

11 minutes ago, egg said:

The theory takes us nowhere though and is pointless. Boro were / are cunts, but whether we were baited or not, we bit. 

Nothing anyone says on here gets us anywhere. Everything posted on here is pointless  😂😂😂

what it does do is highlight how fucking stupid and/or arrogant we were. 

Edited 46 minutes ago by Turkish

[Sheaf Saint]

8 minutes ago, Ekelund24 said:

.The other thing that jumped out in the report is that Middlesboro were aware of the Oxford spying on the same day as we spied on them which seems a little random unless they were already aware (which may well be stated somewhere else in the 200 odd pages previous)

Yes it's been highlighted before and is now key to the whole entrapment theory. Boro had seemingly been fed their evidence of us doing it to multiple clubs before Salt turned up at Rockcliffe. 

[AlexLaw76]

2 minutes ago, Turkish said:

Nothing anyone says on here gets us anywhere. Everything posted on here is pointless  😂😂😂

what it does do is highlight how fucking stupid and/or arrogant we were. 

"yeah, sorry about that Gibbo, but we are happy to pay the fine"

[Hopper]

So many stories circulating about Eckert in the press and he's still currently employed and first team manager, another wonderful PR job from Saints.

At least suspend the man pending FA investigation if you want to wait for that so you don't have to pay him out.

[leesaint88]

3 minutes ago, Hopper said:

So many stories circulating about Eckert in the press and he's still currently employed and first team manager, another wonderful PR job from Saints.

At least suspend the man pending FA investigation if you want to wait for that so you don't have to pay him out.

Like any workplace they'll need to make sure they've got everything in order before removing him. I'm almost certain we'll see a public announcement he's gone around 1100hrs today..

[musesaint]

It would be fair to say that this whole sorry saga has turned out to be every bit as bad as initially rumored. Most of us would never have thought this possible - and I still can’t understand how the club has managed to get itself into such an utterly shambolic mess. It’s going to take years for the club to recover – if it ever does.
 

Quite apart from the reports of lies, bullying and spying the mess which the club is now in exposes fundamental failings at the heart of Saints’ corporate management and accountability. Massive reconstruction is required from top to bottom if the club is to have any chance of recovering its reputation in the future.

[Hopper]

Just now, leesaint88 said:

Like any workplace they'll need to make sure they've got everything in order before removing him. I'm almost certain we'll see a public announcement he's gone around 1100hrs today..

Of course but anyone can be suspended, we're not even trying to look good 😂

[die Mannyschaft]

21 minutes ago, Leighsterrr said:

That's where I am with it, I just don't think I understand (cue Tonda's chant 😬)

a, why we thought it was a good idea

b, what we achieved by it

c, why it's causing such a shit storm

And trying to feel better and convince myself that renewing my season ticket is better than cutting my nose off to spite my face

, why it's causing such a shit storm

Anything that can be launched on social media to influence fans, public, voters from a individual to company will be blown out of proportion.  No one can tell from the narrative if it correct, over the top, biased once one of the versions  and in this case the punishment of final removal gains momentum that's it no going back. Saints totally miss judged the public opinion and Boro influence and power. Saints let the storm continue into a tornado as they kept quiet thinking a £200k fine will be just tge storm damage.

[Saint NL]

I think they're waiting until 5pm on Saturday to sack him. It'll be the main story in all the sports press, second biggest story will be 'middlesborough win playoff final'

[Turkish]

8 minutes ago, AlexLaw76 said:

"yeah, sorry about that Gibbo, but we are happy to pay the fine"

That actually beggars belief doesn’t it. “Don’t worry lads I’ve had a word with him and sorted it out”

[die Mannyschaft]

7 minutes ago, Hopper said:

So many stories circulating about Eckert in the press and he's still currently employed and first team manager, another wonderful PR job from Saints.

At least suspend the man pending FA investigation if you want to wait for that so you don't have to pay him out.

Saints will do the cheaper option which is wait until EFL come up with a way yo sack him or the FA with a ban. 

[die Mannyschaft]

3 minutes ago, Hopper said:

Of course but anyone can be suspended, we're not even trying to look good 😂

Maybe our PR company is a subsidiary of a company owned by Boro, 

[benjii]

35 minutes ago, egg said:

So what's the complaint? That's a bit like complaining that a cop was parked around the corner cos he was tipped off about a drink driver by a bloke who'd bought said driver a few beers. 

It's a failure to act in good faith. What they should have done was reported the Oxford evidence to the EFL sooner as they were clearly given it beforehand by the whistleblower.

Edited 29 minutes ago by benjii

[Osvaldorama]

40 minutes ago, egg said:

You're overthinking the relevance. There is no conflict of interests, and not even a declarable interest imo. BUT, if the club were looking at going further, they'd probably look at the failure to disclose a link (assuming that's the case) but for me it's so distant and remote, it won't get anywhere. 

Im not, this entire thing was trial by media in which Boro whipped up a storm to turn a minor rule breach into the crime of the century. 
 

That means we should have been doing the same. Instead we acted like amateurs

[benjii]

14 minutes ago, Sheaf Saint said:

Yes it's been highlighted before and is now key to the whole entrapment theory. Boro had seemingly been fed their evidence of us doing it to multiple clubs before Salt turned up at Rockcliffe. 

Exactly. The whole thing feels very coordinated.

[egg]

1 minute ago, benjii said:

It's a failure to act in good faith. What they should have done was reported the evidence to the EFL sooner.

Arguably, but it's just a deflection from our conduct. 

[Saint86]

58 minutes ago, Hopper said:

Even if that were the case it doesn’t change anything.

The narrative would just be that they had suspicions and laid a trap to catch us red handed. We’re still the guilty party.

I'm not sure if people are trying to just balance the wrong doing in their own minds to feel better or what.

Tonda fucked it. We pay the price. Get the man gone, can’t believe we’ve not sacked him yet.

I'm not wanting to go down the rabbit hole too far, but I do think labelling it as just "suspicions" is being very very kind to Boro.

According to the official report. The same day they first encountered and caught/snapped salt, they also had evidence of him (someone the were yet to encounter) being at Oxford united months earlier in December.

So for this to be fully innocent and as it seems - boro had evidence of a junior intern/analyst (that they were yet to encounter, didn't know, and had to go through a process of id'ing) being at another clubs training ground on the very same day that they encountered him, (and before they even knew who he was). See points 15-17 of the report. 

This is before they allegedly tracked his banking card, before parsons went to Gibson and admitted anything etc.

To be true, they would have had to have id'd salt first themselves, then written to all clubs including Oxford, gotten Oxford to track back through their own CCTV from 4months earlier to find someone that looked like salt from the Boro image, and successfully identified Salt and provided that evidence back to Boro for them to present the evidence to the efl - all in a matter of hours on the afternoon / evening of the Thursday 7th. All of which was before this story broke and was in the media etc.

I would say that sequence of dates/timings is very unlikely and looks like a smoking gun which hull could potentially use - i.e., would it stand up to a legal scrutiny if Boro were required to supply evidence / messages etc. (in the same way that saints were as part of this charge).

It effectively implies that Boro knew who he was and that he'd be there (presumably from from the "whistleblower" (presumably Jason Taylor?)), and that their "media team" was there, ready and waiting with high powered photography equipment to get a snap of him. Which means we were never gaining anything from scouting that training session, and that Boro weren't therefore disadvantaged in the semi final - i.e., result should stand. Hull should be promoted or we should have played the final - but with a hefty fine and -4 points.

Sadly, I think Boro will get away with all of this and likely get promoted. But the reality is they really do look to have used saints' indiscretions as their own extra life in the playoffs.

Nothing in that excuses us for being idiots and illegally scouting clubs training sessions for an advantage, but the punishment we've received is well OTT... sadly Parsons and co. have committed suicide for the club after the fact on that front.

You can probably make the case that Boro being pre-prepared for all of this is part of why their media campaign was so effective as well. They have absolutely hammered saints off the pitch. Parson heading us up was like sending a lamb into the lions dens.

Edited 19 minutes ago by Saint86

[egg]

2 minutes ago, Osvaldorama said:

Im not, this entire thing was trial by media in which Boro whipped up a storm to turn a minor rule breach into the crime of the century. 
 

That means we should have been doing the same. Instead we acted like amateurs

That's a different issue. Your point was about the bloke on the panel. He didn't have a conflict of interests. 

Say my firm sues a client for unpaid fees. He disputes it. We end up in court. The judge worked at or, or even was a partner in my firm, years ago. On your approach that judge must step aside. In reality he wouldn't and shouldn't. 

I get that people are annoyed, but we've put the turds on our own doorstep, nobody else.

[wild-saint]

Aside the cheating and toxic working environment what i find is how amateur the club is in terms of their operations teams. 

Seemingly it appears it’s the Whatapp chat  history remaining on the phones of employees tha provided the evidence of previous incidents. FFS, why are the club employees allowed to use 3rd party apps not controlled by the club? Provide them company phones, lock them down to approved apps, personal  phones have the company controlled app that can be wiped on exit from their jobs. Absolute basic IT security as part of your Data Leak Protection Policies. Absolute amateur hour. 

 

[Osvaldorama]

3 minutes ago, egg said:

That's a different issue. Your point was about the bloke on the panel. He didn't have a conflict of interests. 

Say my firm sues a client for unpaid fees. He disputes it. We end up in court. The judge worked at or, or even was a partner in my firm, years ago. On your approach that judge must step aside. In reality he wouldn't and shouldn't. 

I get that people are annoyed, but we've put the turds on our own doorstep, nobody else.

Im not trying to defend anything we have done. I agree that we are turds  

What I am saying if this was the other way around, Boro’s journalists would have been out in force saying the board is corrupt, the judge is an ex Saints player etc. 

They were weaponising all these little bits against us in a smart way.

Public opinion and media outcry had a huge sway in this case and we let them win it with ease 

Edited 21 minutes ago by Osvaldorama

[S-Clarke]

2 minutes ago, egg said:

Arguably, but it's just a deflection from our conduct. 

I think the biggest gripe here is that this game has been decided off the pitch, Hull fans believe the same. What we did was stupid, we are totally guilty, bang to rights, utter morons. But equally, the orchestrated media campaign by Boro to expose this has been just as murky, dirty and certainly not 'in good faith'.

Boro felt wronged, I get that, totally. But they had 2 games to put that right on the football pitch, and this is football at the end of the day. They couldn't put it right on the football pitch, so they went nuclear off the pitch and beat us off of it instead. In essence, they had 4 legs to beat us - not 2.

The issue with the result is that it seems to have purely favoured Middlesborough, not sporting integrity or fans. Just what Middlesborough wanted. It wasn't just Boro we had done this to, but they've used it in a way so they get the maximum reward for the fallout and in the same throw penalise Hull, Wrexham and Derby to a degree.

The EFL have handled this terribly from the start, but my feeling is that they decided on expulsion the moment Boro cried to them, and it was up to us to convince them otherwise - but once the Boro media machine got going, we were KO and couldn't even get back up to mount a defence. 

[so22saint]

1 hour ago, Willo of Whiteley said:

I actually don’t give a toss about the outcome. It’s happened, it’s done.

Working with people who suffer with mental health who can’t cope with certain pressures in life - I hope Will Salt is being looked after.

I also hope he puts in a formal grievance for the way this has been handled by the club and national media.

Some would’ve “called it a day” as soon as they’re in the national press. 

I don’t think anyone involved has thought about that.

One personal upside of all this is that it gave me the push to finally seek therapy after 30 years of anger, black dog etc. Maybe Tonda's saved my life, the boggle eyed twat

[saintant]

6 hours ago, Sunnyside Saint said:

I wonder if any of our players will end up playing for Middlesborough in the premier league should they gain promotion?

'Hello Johannes. It's Gibbo here. Listen, we're interested in Taylor Harwood Bellis'

'Get fucked'

'Is that a no then?'

[so22saint]

2 minutes ago, wild-saint said:

Aside the cheating and toxic working environment what i find is how amateur the club is in terms of their operations teams. 

Seemingly it appears it’s the Whatapp chat  history remaining on the phones of employees tha provided the evidence of previous incidents. FFS, why are the club employees allowed to use 3rd party apps not controlled by the club? Provide them company phones, lock them down to approved apps, personal  phones have the company controlled app that can be wiped on exit from their jobs. Absolute basic IT security as part of your Data Leak Protection Policies. Absolute amateur hour. 

 

On this point, I've worked with a number of football clubs and they are *unbelievably* amateur in their set up for companies that do 100s of millions of £.  This is because the TV money creates a false external view that they'll be as professional as a "normal" company of that size whereas in reality most of that money flows straight to the players and football has traditionally been a family run business with family run levels of corporate professionalism.

Man U, City and Spurs were very on it when I worked with them.  Liverpool much more old school (it was just pre-Klopp, they made me have a photo under Mané's shirt -ha ha wankers), and I'd imagine my beloved Saints are worse than that.

Till I leave this CEO job and take Parsons 😂 

[saintant]

2 hours ago, Saint_clark said:

Having read the report, kicking us out was the right decision. I can't believe Tonda wasn't sacked immediately upon admitting he was responsible. 

The only thing that sounded dodgy from the report was the fact they said that the circumstances of the Leeds case were different enough that they didn't warrant being considered in relation to our punishment...but then considered an example from the world of motorsport. Righto. 

 

Also, this bloke who played for Boro, even if only for one game, shouldn't have been on the panel. Do we really think that if a former Saints player had been on the panel and we'd been allowed to play in the final that Gibson would have let that go? Absolutely not. 

Gibbo is Gibbo. Parsons is Parsons. Think of chalk and cheese.

[Football Special]

51 minutes ago, egg said:

So what's the complaint? That's a bit like complaining that a cop was parked around the corner cos he was tipped off about a drink driver by a bloke who'd bought said driver a few beers. 

Fucking hell clearly.its not like that,  Middlesbrough realised they stood to GAIN from the situation and have benefited from it

 

[saintant]

1 hour ago, Turkish said:

According to the reports the security staff approached Salt but he ran away, he ran into a toilet in the golf club, changed his clothes and then fled the scene 

1 - why didn’t the security staff follow him into the building and catch him in the toilet? They must have seen him run in there as they knew he did 

2 - there is no sign of a bag or anything that would he carry a change of clothing in the photo of Salt

3 - he must have been superman to change his clothes so quickly, like when Clark Kent runs into a telephone box and comes out as superman, to do it quickly enough evade the security team that had supposedly only seconds ago approached him and he ran off

 

hmmmmmm…..

Nah, that's just a conspiracy theory, not allowed to put stuff like that on here because Boro are squeaky clean in all this. Mind you, all good points that need answering 🙂

[sadoldgit]

1 hour ago, Leighsterrr said:

I bet he'd have changed in a telephone box if he could have found one sooner 🙄

Modern life has buggered up the operating model for superheroes. The iPhone has a lot to answer for after Spygate in more ways than one.

[saintant]

1 hour ago, Football Special said:

Seems odd that a handful of posters on here are so blinkered they just want to dismiss anything as "we were guilty so nothing else matters" 

Clearly the context is important. 

Role of the "whistleblower" for me is key to allowing Middlesbrough to hatch the plot and use it to their benefit. 

Links to EFL board. 

EFL have followed Middlesbrough instructions whole way through, clear to see. 

Fair to ask questions of independent panel. 

"New rule" with no defined punishment . Leeds admitted to same actions as Saints, punishment should have acted as a precedent to be considered, 200k fine to Saints punishment clearly disproportionate 

Completely agree.

[kitch]

10 hours ago, Thripp87 said:

If it couldn’t get any worse, Bet Victor have a certain John Mousinho as second favourite to be the next Southampton manager. 

He's done a great job at them down the road, to be fair.

[S-Clarke]

2 minutes ago, saintant said:

Nah, that's just a conspiracy theory, not allowed to put stuff like that on here because Boro are squeaky clean in all this. Mind you, all good points that need answering 🙂

I've just reported these points to our lawyers, but it seems as if who was presenting us has had a change of career overnight.,