Saints unhappy with Doncaster's role

Neil Doncaster's position on the Football League Board has come under the spotlight due to an alleged conflict of interest involving Southampton's 10-point penalty.

Neil Doncaster's position on the Football League Board has come under the spotlight due to an alleged conflict of interest involving Southampton's 10-point penalty.

Apparently, there is a lot of upset on the South Coast that the eight-strong Football League board included Doncaster, the chief executive of Norwich, who are one of the clubs still fighting to avoid relegation from the Championship with two games left and so directly affected by the Southampton verdict.

The Football League took the precaution of receiving legal advice over Doncaster taking part in the board's debate on Southampton's fate.

And the Norwich supremo registered his particular conflict before the start of the Southampton discussion and did not participate in the vote.

But official Norwich websites had predicted Doncaster would 'speak forcibly on the subject' at board level and was hardly likely, in the circumstances, to be advocating that the Saints escaped a points deduction this season.

Doncaster said: 'It is my fiduciary duty during board meetings to discuss issues from a Football League perspective, which is always the case.'