EFL’s Leeds oversight has opened up nightmare can of Spygate worms | OneFootball

When Leeds were caught spying in 2019, there was some sympathy for the decision-makers at the EFL that they were being faced with a situation they had never come across.

Spying, or at least such blatant examples of it, was new to the EFL and the football authorities simply did not have a defined rule against it. After charging Leeds and an unbothered Marcelo Bielsa £200,000 with a breach of the catch-all rule of not acting in ‘good faith’, the EFL sought to protect themselves in future by instating a rule that categorically forbids spying:

Rule 127 states: ‘Without prejudice to the requirements of Regulation 3.4 (that each Club shall behave towards each other Club with the utmost good faith), no Club shall directly or indirectly observe (or attempt to observe) another Club’s training session in the period of 72 hours prior to any match scheduled to be played between those respective Clubs.’

What that rule does not state is what exactly happens if a club is charged and found guilty of this. That is the legal grey area the EFL has put itself in.

It’s been over a week since an analysis intern at Southampton was spotted ‘hiding’ behind a tree and recording Boro’s training sessions on his iPhone. We are still no closer to learning what the outcome will be.

The problem for the EFL is that the story has escaped the Championship eco-sphere and entered the world of mainstream media. The world where you have leaked images sent to the Daily Mail of the alleged spy. The world where you have Sky Sports reporters standing behind a tree. The world where you, for some reason, get James Corden giving an opinion on what punishment would be fair.

A lot of eyes are suddenly on the EFL, who do not have a strong track record of making difficult decisions at the best of times.

The rock and the hard place that the EFL finds itself in is that no solution will please everyone. Southampton are the favourites going into the play-off final against a Hull team that finished sixth and so a fine, which seems the most likely punishment, will be seen as the price of promotion.

On the other hand, kicking Southampton out would not only be one of the most severe punishments ever inflicted by the EFL but also raises the question of whether a final is even held? Do Hull go up automatically? Do Middlesbrough play instead? Who are Hull supposed to prepare to play given they do not know for sure who their opponents will be next week?

Sky are likely to want to have a say in this for they would not want to give up their biggest non-Premier League game of the season. Wembley, too, has already incurred the various costs of hosting 90,000 people.

Of course, the real ones that suffer the most are the fans – of all three of Hull, Southampton and Middlesbrough.

On Thursday, the EFL released a statement saying that a hearing of Independent Disciplinary Commission will ‘take place on or before Tuesday, 19 May.’ If is the latter, that is just four days before the showpiece event at Wembley.

The statement also said “Notwithstanding this, the EFL continues to plan on the basis that the Championship Play-Off Final will take place as scheduled on Saturday 23 May, with the kick-off time confirmed as 4.30pm.” Seemingly providing reassurance to the fans only to then rip it away again by stating: “Supporters should, however, be aware that the outcome of the disciplinary proceedings may yet result in changes to the fixture.”

Clear as mud then.

While Southampton fans are also not to blame, the fans you most sympathise with are Hull’s: they have done nothing wrong and yet there will be thousands who have booked hotels and travel for a game that may not even go ahead on the same date.

Both clubs have now begun ticket sales with the asterisked caveat of the kick off time is “subject to change.”

If the game is moved, tickets will be refunded but train tickets won’t be. Hotels won’t be. Days booked off work won’t be. It is not unreasonable to think that overseas Hull or Southampton fans will have booked to come back and see their team under the arch at Wembley.

Every day that goes by, those travel prices and hotel rooms get more and more expensive and there is a big difference between booking a week and half before the event and four days before it.

Southampton are dragging their feet through the process. Tonda Eckert’s press conferences have been a race to see how quickly he can walk out with the Saints press officer insisting that “no comment” is responding to questions.

CEO Phil Parsons spoke before the second leg to state that while they are “fully cooperating with the EFL and the Disciplinary Commission”, they wanted more time to complete an internal review. Except there is no time.

If the play-off date is postponed, a next question is “to when?”.

The League One and Two finals are the following days after the original Championship date. Five days later and the pitch is being used for rugby. Then a day later it’s the women’s FA Cup final before concert season begins. Not to mention that whoever does go up is suddenly at a disadvantage to their new league opponents who have had a week extra off and more time to plan for next season with transfers.

The EFL, then, is in an unenviable position but one that they themselves could have avoided had they just written one extra line in a rule change they made seven years ago.