Southampton have been thrown out of the play-offs after admitting they spied on three clubs in the Championship season.<\/p>\n
Middlesbrough, beaten by Southampton in the semi-final, have been reinstated and will now play Hull City for a place in the Premier League.<\/p>\n
The EFL charged Saints with watching training sessions involving Oxford United and Ipswich Town, in addition to filming Middlesbrough as they prepared for the first leg of their play-off semi-final on 7 May.<\/p>\n
The independent disciplinary commission also handed Southampton a four-point deduction in the Championship for next season.<\/p>\n
Saints will now miss out on a game dubbed the richest in world football, with the winners of the play-off final guaranteed a minimum \u00a3110m in Premier League broadcast revenue.<\/p>\n
The final will remain on Saturday at Wembley with the kick-off time to be confirmed.<\/p>\n
Southampton admitted to “multiple breaches of EFL regulations related to the unauthorised filming of other clubs’ training”, the EFL said.<\/p>\n
The club have also received a reprimand in respect of all the charges.<\/p>\n
Sources have confirmed to BBC Sport that Southampton will lodge an appeal on Wednesday and will argue that the punishment is disproportionate.<\/p>\n
The EFL said it would be “working to try and resolve any appeal on Wednesday 20 May”. <\/p>\n
It added that “subject to the outcome, it could result in a further change to Saturday’s fixture”.<\/p>\n
The appeal will be heard by an Independent League Arbitration panel with three new members. <\/p>\n
The EFL said in a statement: “Southampton was first charged on Friday 8 May, with further charges issued on Sunday 17 May in relation to additional breaches during the 2025-26 season.<\/p>\n
“Those additional charges arose from matters identified after the initial proceedings involving Middlesbrough were initiated.<\/p>\n
“Southampton admitted breaches of regulations requiring clubs to act with the utmost good faith and prohibiting the observation of another club’s training session within 72 hours of a scheduled match.<\/p>\n
“The admitted breaches concern fixtures against Oxford United in December 2025, Ipswich Town in April 2026 and Middlesbrough in May 2026.”<\/p>\n
Southampton did not win any of the three games – they lost 2-1 at Oxford, drew 2-2 at home to Ipswich and claimed a 0-0 draw at Boro.<\/p>\n
The statement continued: “The EFL is now in discussion with all three clubs regarding the implications of today’s decision and will make a further announcement in due course.”<\/p>\n
Middlesbrough issued a statement which said they “welcome the outcome”.<\/p>\n
“We believe this sends out a clear message for the future of our game regarding sporting integrity and conduct,” it added.<\/p>\n
“As a club, we are now focused on our game against Hull City at Wembley on Saturday. Ticket information for our supporters will be available shortly.”<\/p>\n
Southampton had already sold tickets for Saturday’s game, and their supporters will receive a full refund.<\/p>\n
They must now wait to see if the Football Association issues any charges for individuals involved in the spying. The EFL can only apply sanctions against its member clubs.<\/p>\n
After a spying case at the 2024 Olympic Games, three members of Canada’s staff, including the head coach, were banned from all football by Fifa for a year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Southampton have been thrown out of the play-offs after admitting they spied on three clubs in the Championship…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":681522,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[563],"tags":[64,63,596,85],"class_list":["post-681521","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-football","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/681521","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=681521"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/681521\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/681522"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=681521"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=681521"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=681521"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}