When Saints became sinners

On 7th May 2026, during preparations for the Championship Play Off sei final against Southampton, officials from Middlesborough noticed a person acting stangly, observing and filming Borogh's training session.

The person doing the filming, deleted data, ran to a nearby golf course and changed clothes.

He was later identified as an employee of Southampton FC.

Initially Southampton denied filming had taken place and no data was produced. This emerged as a misrepresentation of the truth. Not only was data recorded, it seemed the intern doing the filming was livestreaming the filming back to Southampton.

The Southampton Manager, Tonder Erhart, refused to answer questions about the incident in the run up to the two legs of the semi final, even walking out of a press conference after a journalist asked if he had cheated.

The semi final was played, and Southampton won, so would meet Hull in the final on the 23rd May.

Middlesbourough rasied the issue with the Football League, and a date was set for a hearing, 19th May. Five days before the play off final.

In the meantime, two further charges were raised against Southampton stating that spying had taken place before games against Oxford and Ipswich.

Previously, Leeds had been found guilty of similar spying, and fined £200,000. But in the wake of that, additional rules were brought in and agreed by the 72 clubs banning such spying, or scouting, within 72 hours of a match.

On May 19th, Southampton were thrown out of the play-offs and Middlesborough reinstated. In addition, they would be subject to a points deduction of four points for next season. The explusion was for the Middlesborough offence, and two each for the Oxford and Ipswich offences.

An appeal was heard within 24 hours, and the punishments were confirmed.

Documentation was released after the appeal showing Erkhart knew and ecnouraged the spying, and even complained that the footage obtained on 7th May wasn't good enough and would have to be redone.

So, Southampton's manager not only knew, but was the driving force behind the spying, and chose to say nothing until the semi-final had been played and won. Thus, I would imagine they thought strengthening their case, making expulsion more unlikely. Expecting a £200,000 fine, they must have been shocked to find the Football League took the charges seriously.

Very seriously.

After the appeal, there was no right to further appeal, and the final was played, Hull City winning to be promoted from 6th place in the final table.

The Football League can only bring charges against its members: the football clubs. But the Football Association can, and will, bring charges against those implicated. And lengthy bans from the game can be expected.

For me, the denial and refusing to answer questions when the manager/coach knew, is damning. And for that should have been kicked out of the competition.

It is likely that other offences will be found, and puncished. And at the moment it is unclear who at the club knew about the spying, so the club has said nothing.

Players, who upon relegation last May took a 40% drop in wages, and might have expected for that to be reinstation upon promotion, might now sue the club. As might clubs like Wrexham who missed out on promotion, partly, as a result of the spying. They might argue that the points deduction should have applied to this season, thus lifting them into the play-off, so they should be replayed.

We don't know.

Southampton are in debt. In addition they owe £99 million in transfer installments. If they have to pay players and other clubs compensation, Southampton could be plunged into financial crisis.

Its a mess. And one of the club's own making, and has forever tarnished the clubs name and image.