Football thrives on drama. Said drama really should play out on the pitch; that’s what we fork over our hard earned to watch week in, week out. Unfortunately in the modern era, the voracious gods of rolling news need constant feeding, hence every little ripple becomes a microdrama. Big personalities are increasingly common, such is our thirst to be entertained. Every now and again, though, something huge and genuinely dramatic comes along and subsumes the entire football ecosystem. The last couple of weeks have presented a classic of the genre.
Oh god, it’s a football one. What is he doing?! He knows we hate this shit. Seriously, shut up at the back, this is a fucking doozy.
On the 9th of May, Middlesbrough played Southampton at the Riverside Stadium. It was the first leg of their Championship semi-final play-off. The match saw Boro dominate the Saints in the first half, although the game finished 0-0. In the second leg, three days later at Southampton’s St Mary’s Stadium, the hosts edged out a 2-1 to send them through to the final at Wembley - where they would play Hull (who had beaten Millwall in the other semi). The Championship play-off final is commonly known as The Richest Game in Football due to the fact that promotion to the Premier League is supposedly worth £200m to the winners.
I’m a fan of a club who have won this game. The stakes are gigantic. Brentford beat Swansea in 2021 to claim our place at the top table. This was a Covid season and attendance at Wembley was restricted; consequently I watched the game with my pals in a Brentford boozer. Around the 88th minute, with Brentford 2-0 up and Swansea down to ten men, I leaned over to my mate and whispered (or so I thought) “We can’t fuck it up from here, can we?”
I was five pints deep and of course I wasn’t whispering. The entire beer garden turned on me, telling me to shut up and pelting me with assorted receptacles and condiments. Brentford fans are used to fucking things up, and I should’ve known better than to even chance a jinx at that point.
We didn’t fuck it up, and we’ve been living the high life ever since.
Point of the story is, the Championship play-off final is big. Huge. The prize is astronomical in terms of revenue and the pressure is, frankly, fucking enormous. Even supporters feel it in the build up, god only knows what the players and the coaches must be going through.
With so much at stake, savvy football fans pricked up their ears when rumblings about spying came out of the North East. Middlesbrough alleged that a Southampton coach had been caught on camera filming their training routines two days prior to their first game. Boro’s training ground sits next to a public golf course; when rumbled the guy in question attempted to hide behind a tree, before legging it across the golf course like a low rent Alan Partridge, doing an outfit change in the clubhouse, then scarpering altogether.
Pretty juicy, right?
It gets juicier. The dude was quickly identified as Will Salt, an intern who had been pictured with Saint’s manager Tonde Eckert on Southampton’s official website. Boro cried foul; Southampton claimed Salt was acting off his own back; Eckert walked out of a press conference when asked directly if he was a cheat.
Now, there’s a precedent. In 2019, then Leeds manager Marcelo Bielsa admitted to sending a coach to spy on Frank Lampard’s Derby County. Leeds were fined £200k for a breach of EFL1 regulations. Subsequently, the EFL amended their own regulations to make watching an opposition training session 72 hours before a game a specific offence.
Such is the absurdity of English football’s governing bodies, if Will Salt had watched that Middlesbrough training session 73 hours before kick off, Southampton would have been fine. They might’ve got a slap on the wrist. But young Will (as opposed to Will Young, who is entirely unconnected to this saga) was watching within the 72 hour window.
When you consider that Southampton fans were seen celebrating their winning goal miming binoculars at their Boro counterparts, not to mention club captain Taylor Harwood-Bellis doing likewise on the pitch, you can sort of understand Middlesbrough’s rancour at how events had panned out.
The local press in the North-East, tenacious in a way that only local journos can be, were relentless in digging up more and more details. The Southampton CEO had apparently admitted wrong doing to his Boro counterpart; Eckert (a German, by the way, and we all know how proper Englishmen feel about Germans) coughed to the fact that he didn’t know spying was an offence in English football, in fact it was normal behaviour elsewhere. One particularly dogged journo, Dominic Shaw, dug up a further precedent: Stockton Town had been ejected from the Northern Premier League play-offs for fielding an ineligible player.
Fans of both clubs raged on message boards, comments sections, and social media. The Boro faithful undoubtedly had the moral high ground, however Saints’ fans clung to the belief that this was an isolated incident and the footballing machine would not be knocked off course by a lengthy investigation and inquest.
The EFL launched their investigation. The potential punishments could be financial, points deductions in subsequent seasons, or even expulsion from the play-off final. Perennially online ITKs2 confidently predicted Boro being ‘awarded’ a 3-0 win for the first leg. No one knew anything really. I mean, Sofascore is a superb app for football fans, but it appeared to be having a breakdown midweek.
Because while all of this was going on, The Richest Game in Football was still scheduled to take place on Saturday 23rd of May. The logistics of the machine must be addressed. Tickets to be bought, travel to be arranged, hotels to be booked. Fans of both clubs were in limbo. Executives at both clubs ploughed on like they were going to be in the final despite the fact that, obviously, one of them would not be. Poor old Hull had to prepare for something; they didn’t know exactly what yet, but asking them to play both opponents in a triple threat would be beyond the pale.
The wider footballing world watched on, agog. Drama and controversy are addictive as fuck in the digital age, and these two unlikely rivals were delivering both in spades.
Finally, on the 19th of May, an independent EFL commission decided that Southampton had breached that new regulation by spying on Middlesbrough. Not only that, but they had admitted to doing so on two occasions during the regular league schedule as well, against Oxford United in December and Ipswich in April. Saint’s were hit with a four point suspension in the 26-27 season and ejected from the play-off final, with Boro taking their place.
Southampton appealed, which was their right, and released a mealy-mouthed statement which absolutely wasn’t. It basically amounted to “Okay yeah, we cheated but we shouldn’t be denied £200m because of it.” No guarantee you would’ve won the final, lads, steady on. Lost a lot of good faith from the neutrals with that one.
Yes, of course their appeal was rejected. The final on Saturday will be Hull versus Middlesbrough.
Like I said about 1000 words ago, most football fans want their drama to play out on the pitch. Most are not terminally online, meme-ing their rivals to death on socials or frothing impotently on a message board. Most of us want to watch a good game and take home the win. Few beers with the lads and see you again next time, cheers.
But of there must be drama off the pitch then it must be epic and, more importantly, happening to other people. There’s nothing more fun than watching on when you’ve got zero skin in the game. And whooo, baby, this Boro/Southampton thing has delivered in spades. I’ve been mainlining it for days.
Two clubs that most football fans would have no strong feelings either way about, suddenly tearing lumps out of each other on and off the pitch for two straight weeks. A clear case of good and evil. Accusations and recriminations. An actual fucking German cast as the bad guy3 (you can bet the tabloids loved this little wrinkle). And fallout, so much delicious fallout.
My favourite so far has been Southampton hero and confirmed nutjob Matt Le Tissier. A bona fide legend, he (like so many others) was utterly broken by Covid and has now become a free thinker conspiracy minded lunatic.
Last seen arguing with Grok, in which he accused an LLM owned by a legit Bond villain of ‘being programmed to think a certain way’, Le Tiss was of course wheeled out to opine on the latest travails to befall an institution that once paid him a lot of money.
Ignoring all logic and evidence, ignoring the fact Southampton had coughed to not just one breach but multiple, this once great footballer told The Sun:
It feels like you’ve been put on trial for murder when all you’ve done is stolen a Mars bar from the corner shop. That’s kind of what it feels like to me.
No, Matthew. That’s not what it’s like. Not even close.
This one is going to run on for years. Maybe even decades. While most football fans content themselves with tribalism towards their neighbours4, we are also happy to hold grudges when slighted that transcend mere geography. Coventry and Sunderland detest each other after some final day shenanigans in 1977, while Crystal Palace and Brighton’s rivalry developed from a period of attrition in the 1970s (they played each other five times in one season) and saw actual human shit spattered over an away dressing room in 2013.
The banter5 outcome here is for Hull to win the play-off final. They are an entirely innocent party in all of this, caught up in the maelstrom of chaos created by both of their potential opponents. What better conclusion than Hull winning The Richest Game in Football and ascending to the Premier League, while the newly created South Coast/Tees rivalry rumbles on in the Championship for so many seasons to come?
“Grandad, why do Southampton and Middlesbrough hate each other?”
“Oooh, that’s a good question. Well, you see, 60 years ago a coach at Southampton sent an intern to spy on Boro’s training session before a big game. He used one of those old iPhones, have I ever showed you one of those? Of course I have. Well, it all started with that.”
“And they’ve hated each other ever since?”
“Yes they have.”
“Football is weird, grandad.”
It certainly is, future boy. However, this sort of bizarre football lore is a big reason why we all love the sport so much.
I’ll watch the final on Saturday; no dog in the fight but a strong desire to see Hull City triumphant. Because the schadenfreude I’ll get out of two previously unconnected football clubs playing each other again and again under a cloud of animosity will be pure and unfettered. History was created this week, it just needs to play out.
Thanks for being here. As we established long ago my ego is vast yet fragile, so please show some love on your way out - reader interaction makes this gig so much more fun. Have your say in the comments, or restack the piece to help other people find it. Or you can just bang the like button before you go, even that drives the algos in the right direction. If you buy me a pint I’ll love you forever. Cheers, hope to see you again soon.
English Football League
In The Knows
Long time readers will know that my grandfather was German, so I’m safe in pointing and laughing at a lazy stereotype mostly perpetuated by people who are now in their 80s.
Brentford hold a deep hatred towards QPR that’s more than just proximity. In 1967 those wretched Hoops tried to put the Bees out of existence.
A word I normally fucking loathe, but it does fit this particular tale.
Remember when 'Arry Redknapp took Southampton down and the Portsmouth fans reverse-ferreted their 'Hang the traitor!' chants to produce 'Congratulations, Agent Redknapp - Mission Accomplished!' banners?
Maybe 'Arry was also the double agent mastermind in charge of this dastardly espionage, with the Boro files being left in a dead letter drop on the golf course for Rosie the dog to collect.
Mission Implausible II.
Spying and sports scandals have such a fun, rich history, on both sides of the pond. There've been some legendary, epic tales of cheating and spying in the US of A. I won't bore you with all those sordid tales, but this Southampton fiasco has echoes with the New England Patriots' very own Spygate incident in 2007.
This manager has to be done coaching forever, if not just in England, right?
I wonder if there was spying going on in any other matches besides the ones they highlighted (Oxford and Ipswich) - would that explain their terrific form late in the season, perhaps.
I've read and digested so many stories about this and the Southampton fans' reactions have been interesting. Thankfully, many of them are sensible and accept the punishment and are ashamed. But the most absurdly asinine defence has to be those nitwits who say things like 'this punishment is harsh, think about the fans who've already made arrangements, bought tickets, the anticipation of a playoff final, you can do this to us/them' Goodness gracious.
I'm definitely behind Hull tomorrow.