Having looked through the report and how the so called Independent panel arrived at it's decision, it is clear that there will be nasty tastes left in the mouths of both sides of the situation and questions to be asked.

I would state first and foremost that no one can really defend the actual actions of Southampton Football Club, the regulations are quite clear and claiming ignorance of those regulations is not a defence nor an excuse.

However there still remains the question as to whether the punishment fits the severity of the crime and whether the actual proceedings themselves were conducted in a fair and proper manner.

Below is the link to the report itself on the EFL website.

EFL Report

Having read it there are some questions that remain unanswered.

1. Whether Saints were forced to allow the case to be steamrollered through at indecent haste, it seems that the initial charge was brought on Friday 8th May and Southampton should have had 14 days to assess the charges before submitting their response.

With the severity of the charges levied, this was surely critical, the EFL lodged a request to the panel on Sunday 17th May that this timescale be abridged and that a hearing be held on the 19th May.

Southampton objected to this on Monday 18th May, but the panel ruled the hearing would go ahead.

Given the complexities of the situation and charges that had been changed on that Sunday, giving Saints only two days notice of the hearing was unfair.

2. The panel was meant to be independent, but it included solicitor David Winnie who had formerly been a professional footballer and had played for Middlesbrough on loan, so that should surely constitute a conflict of interest.

Even more so potentially for Lydia Bannejee, it has been alleged that she has previously represented Middlesbrough FC in various sports-related and regulatory matters, if this is true, how could Saints expect to get a fair hearing with two members of the Independent panel having links to Middlesbrough FC.

3. The panel was conducted via video link on the morning of Tuesday 19th May and despite the fact that it heard the testimonies of 4 witnesses from the EFL one who provided oral testimony to the hearing and also 4 oral witnesses from Saints plus several testimonies , one of the witnesses although not names was an intern described as an associate of the club, more of that later.

The Panel went straight to its deliberations and had told the clubs of their findings at 14.44 hrs that afternoon

Surely this verdict was decided with indecent haste, the start time was not mentioned but barely 5 hours to conduct a hearing and deliberate over the sentence which would see arguably the harshest penalty in football for many a year is not enough, not to mention that it was held remotely and not in person.

4. After hearing the verdict Saints should have had 14 days to appeal this decision as per item 43 of the report, but the panel perhaps put pressure on Saints by stating that both parties could consider an earlier appeal due to the Play Off final being only 4 days away.

Given that Saints were now caught inbetween a rock and a hard place and that if Middlesbrough played Hull City and won it would complicate matters even further, they had no real choice other than get the appeal heard the following day.

If regulations had been followed initially and given the sentence, you would assume that Saints would wanted more than 24 hours to consider their grounds of appeal etc.

There is also the question of the witnesses, a key witness seems to the Intern who is alleged to have been the spy on all 3 occasions, he is not named in the report but it has been claimed is a man called Will Salt currently studying for a degree in Sports Analyis.

He is said to have told the hearing that he felt pressurised by the club to spy on both Middlesbrough & Oxford, but did so, although he declined to spy on Ipswich.

If it is Will Salt, then his cv stated that he left Southampton in March to go to Aston Villa, so how could the club pressurise him ?

All in all it seems that the EFL holds up the rules and regulations to the letter when it suits them, they were in a difficult decision due to timescale, if they did not play the Final at Wembley on Saturday, given the availability of somewhere to play the game and the fact that clubs had players going on International duty, they had to get this done and dusted.

No one is claiming that Southampton are not guilty of breaching regulations not even the club itself, however we seem to have been lulled into a sense of false security, into accepting the EFL's desire to ignore there own regulations and force through the hearing with indecent haste.

If this case had been brought up in January the charges would have followed regulations and taken a lot longer, 14 days to initially respond to the charges, followed by several weeks to arrange the hearing, likewise after the verdict, we would have 14 days to lodge an appeal followed by more weeks to arrange the hearing for that.

It would be fair to say that the whole process would have taken somewhere around 3 months from initial charge to conclusion, sufficient time for Southampton to digest the charges in full and respond to them, likewise the appeal.

But the hearing took place only 11 days after the initial charge, with only 2 days notice of the hearing date, to put this in perspective under normal circumstances we would only have had to respond to the EFL today Friday 22 May, let alone go to the hearing.

Even more shocking is that for the appeal we were given a veiled threat by the panel perhaps doing the EFL's dirty work for them that it might be in our interests to appeal straight away, so they could deal with it before Saturday's game.

Let's be blunt, we pleaded guilty we are not denying our part in this, but we have not received justice, either in the way such an important issue which merited such a severe sanction, was dealt with outside the EF's rules and regulations with what can only be described as a Kangaroo Court.

If Middlesbrough had seen the verdict go our way, I am sure they would be now lambasting the EFL for not being thorough in their preparations etc.

Given the charges and the evidence you also have to express surprise that the EFL allowed Southampton to sell tickets, from a Saints supporter perspective you have that feeling that the EFL were in a mess and had to get the game played, they knew what the verdict was going to be it was only about timescale.

If we had not played ball and allowed the hearing to be earlier in this week they would be in big trouble, they could not have kicked us out today as they would only be receiving our response to the charges today.

They would not have been able to kick us out and they would ahve to choose with 24 hours notice to proceed with Hull V Saints and risk opening a bigger can of worms that would drag on or cancel the game till the hearing had been heard and concluded including appeals, that was never an option, due to the summer break.

Southampton FC do not come out of this in a good light and nor should they, however I feel that the punishment does not fir the crime and that we should not make the punishment worse by sacking Tonda Eckert, however that decision may be taken out of our hands by the FA.

Ironically there are no rules about spying on training sessions for Premier League clubs, it isn't a problem, most have training complexes that are like high security prisons, if Boro do win and go up then they could find that their training sessions are viewed on a far more regular basis next season and all legally.

All Photos Via Reuters