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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tFILE – Southampton’s coach Tonda Eckert reacts during the FA Cup semifinal soccer match between Manchester City and Southampton in Manchester, England, Saturday, April 25, 2026. (AP Photo\/Kin Cheung, File(<\/p>\n
In a long club statement, Southampton chief executive Phil Parsons accepted \u201cwhat happened was wrong\u201d and that the club deserved to be sanctioned.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat we cannot accept,\u201d Parsons said, \u201cis a sanction which bears no proportion to the offence.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe commission was entitled to impose a sanction,\u201d he added. \u201cIt was not, we will argue, entitled to impose one that is manifestly disproportionate to every previous sanction in the history of the English game.\u201d<\/p>\n
Parsons pointed to Leeds getting fined 200,000 pounds (then $259,000) in 2019 for spying on one of Derby\u2019s training sessions ahead of a Championship game that season. After that, the EFL brought in rules in a bid to prevent a repeat, requiring clubs to act with the \u201cutmost good faith and prohibiting the observation of another club\u2019s training session within 72 hours of a scheduled match.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhereas Leeds United was fined \u00a3200,000 for a similar offence, Southampton has been denied the opportunity to compete in a game worth more than \u00a3200 million and one which means so much to our staff, players and supporters,\u201d Parsons said.<\/p>\n
\n\t\tWinnipeg Free Press | Newsletter\n\t<\/p>\n
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\u201cWe believe the financial consequence of yesterday\u2019s ruling makes it, by a very considerable distance, the largest penalty ever imposed on an English football club.\u201d<\/p>\n
The EFL said Southampton had subsequently admitted to further breaches this season concerning games against Oxford and Ipswich. The club was also deducted four points for next season.<\/p>\n
An arbitration panel will hear Southampton\u2019s appeal later on Wednesday. An outcome is likely late in the day or on Thursday.<\/p>\n
___<\/p>\n
AP soccer: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/soccer<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Southampton heads into its appeal against expulsion from the Championship playoff final believing its punishment is \u201cmanifestly disproportionate\u201d…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":682322,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[440],"tags":[49,48,561,82],"class_list":["post-682321","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-soccer","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-soccer","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/682321","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=682321"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/682321\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/682322"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=682321"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=682321"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=682321"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}