Stevens Inquiry into illegal payments:The English FA begun circling its wagons before today's release of the Stevens report amid fears it will lead to a renewed power struggle with the Premier League.
Lord Stevens, who heads the corporate intelligence firm Quest, and the Premier League's chief executive, Richard Scudamore, will this afternoon announce what measures they feel football must have at its disposal in the fight against corruption.
Stevens' recommendations come with several implied criticisms of the past performance of the FA, and English football's governing body is concerned the Premier League may use those criticisms to attempt to take from the FA its responsibility for policing the game.
Some in football have doubted Quest's eight-month investigation will produce the "smoking-gun" evidence that would prove the existence of irregular payments in Premiership transfer activity. If no such evidence is produced, the FA fear the Premier League may use that as an excuse to close the bungs book or may pass the responsibility to the compliance department at Soho Square and then accuse it of not coming up with the answers.
"We're wary of the whole thing coming to us and people saying we're not worthy of governing the game," said a senior FA official. "There is a danger they'll say, 'Here are some half-results, you must investigate them and if you don't get anyone you're definitely not fit to govern'."
However, those fears are likely to prove unfounded today because the Premier League, having invested £750,000 and much of its reputation in the investigation, know such a step would lead to accusations of a cover-up. The league's official response yesterday was "Wait and see", insisting Stevens' report was independent and had not been shaped by league officials.
How the league proceeds with the findings of the report, however, is in its gift. Even publication of Stevens' report has taken seven days after all but some of the fine detail was delivered to the three-man Premier League board of Scudamore, the secretary, Mike Foster, and the chairman, Sir Dave Richards, fully a week ago.
The league insist the delay resulted merely from a desire to provide Quest with all the available time to polish its report. The Premier League added that in the interim it had held no dialogue with the 20 club chairmen who are its shareholders. It is aware if those who may be accused of wrongdoing were to dictate the next steps it would clearly be a conflict of interest.
It does, however, feel the existence of the Burns report, which called for a "semi-autonomous and arm's-length regulation and compliance unit", should act as a "road map" for the future.
Exactly what it envisages will not be known until the 2pm press conference in London, but Quest is open to the possibility of taking on the compliance unit's responsibilities in the future. However, FA sources stated yesterday it and the governing bodies Fifa and Uefa would resist any attempt at encroachment into their regulatory responsibilities.
