Southampton conducted a "contrived and determined plan" to spy on opponents via "deplorable" treatment of junior members of staff who were pressured to comply, according to the English Football League.
The written reasons from the EFL's independent disciplinary commission, released Thursday, detail why Southampton were expelled from the playoffs, and handed a four-point penalty ahead of next season after being found guilty of spying on three opponents during the past season.
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The judgement makes ugly reading for head coach Tonda Eckert, detailing how he commissioned the spying to check on the availability of a key Middlesbrough player ahead of their playoff semifinal.
Middlesbrough's staff saw a figure filming training on May 7, and subsequently identified him as a first-team analyst intern working for Southampton and complained to the EFL. That led to Southampton being charged by the EFL, before two further instances of the club spying on opponents came to light: Oxford United in December and Ipswich in April.
The same analyst intern was sent to Oxford, but he declined the Ipswich trip. The judgement read: "The EFL submitted that the evidence supported the view that the observations were authorised at a senior level and that the task was delegated to the intern in relation to the MFC [Middlesbrough] incident and the OU [Oxford] incident. He declined to be involved in the IT [Ipswich] incident.
"We heard evidence from the intern who described the pressure he was placed under."
The commission added the stern words were used "because of the way in which junior members of staff were put under pressure to carry out activities which they felt were, at the least, morally wrong."
The report added: "Such staff were in a vulnerable position without job security and with limited ability to object to or resist the instructions given to them.
"We have concluded that there was, on the part of the respondent [Southampton], a contrived and determined plan from the top down to gain a competitive advantage in competitions of real significance by deliberate attendance at opposition training grounds for the purpose of obtaining tactical and selection information.
"It involved far more than innocent activity and a particularly deplorable approach in its use of junior members of staff to conduct the clandestine observations at the direction of senior personnel."
The report also states that Southampton were originally misleading to the EFL on May 8 on the spying allegations. It says the Saints "provided inaccurate information, suggesting that the conduct was not part of the SFC's culture and that no video footage was captured, transmitted, shared or analysed, when in fact the opposite was the case.
"There was transmission and internal dissemination and analysis of footage and observations."
Southampton's head coach reported that the club "derived no material sporting or competitive advantage from viewing and filming opponents' training." But the commission said in response that the integrity of the competition had been harmed by the actions.
The four-point penalty corresponded to the club's offences of spying on Oxford and Ipswich, with the original six-point penalty cut due to the club admitting their guilt. The exclusion of Southampton from the playoffs was the punishment for the Middlesbrough offence.
The panel deemed that a financial penalty would be insufficient such were the riches on offer from the playoff final and promotion to the Premier League.
