trousers

Which jouno?

Did we break the rules? Yes, almost certainly What level of sporting advantage did we gain from breaking the rules? Debatable Is the level of punishment determined on what level of advantage we gained? Probably?

Anyone got any ideas on how to celebrate the upcoming 100 page mark?

Is it for us to prove he didn't or the panel to prove he did...?

Maybe they did...?

Doesn't that depend on whether or not the information that Salt gained ended up in front of Tonda and/or his coaching team? Maybe, Salt phoned the club straight afterwards to say he'd been caught and the club's first reaction was: "Shit... Well, at least refrain from telling us what you gleaned so we can at least use that in our defence"...?

As @Lord Duckhunter says, if it really is a simple case of us sending someone up to spy, in the knowledge we were breaking the rules, can we guess why Parsons came out with the following in his statement: "We understand the discussion and speculation that has followed over recent days, but we also believe it is important that the full context is established before conclusions are drawn." If it was as clear cut a breach as people are saying it must be, then there's no "context" to establish, is there? To me, "establishing context" implies it isn't as straightforward as sending someone up there to break the rules, but I guess it might just be a case of: "well, he would say that, wouldn't he?"...?

Yep, that's what I'm leaning towards at the moment, but only if the nutjob 'conspiracy theories' are wide of the mark!

Fair enough

If it's as clear cut as @Lord Duckhunter says it is, I'm surprised it's taking them more than a couple of hours to conclude the bleedin' obvious...

If we were indeed stupid enough to send someone up there, in the knowledge that we were wilfully breaking the rules, with the possibility of being thrown out of the tournament, with relatively little to gain for such a big risk, then I hope they throw the book at us big time. If we were that thick then we deserve all we get.

Indeed...

In the original Daily Mail (yes, I know...) report, we're led to believe that the Middlesbrough staff who caught him insisted that he delete the footage off his phone, which seems a somewhat bizarre request... Surely Middlesbrough would want to preserve all evidence, not destroy it...? Again, just part of the "something's not quite adding up here" puzzle...

I would usually agree, if the "simple and most obvious" explanation wasn't just as bizarre than some of the conspiracy theories...

Agree, but wouldn't the punishment in that circumstances be significantly less than if we had willingly sent him up there with explicit instructions to spy on a training session knowing that it would be in breach of the rules?