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Also interesting not to see any (to my mind) criticism of the players who were clearly 'in on it' and even if it's not deemed appropriate to criticise the players, I wonder if their association and fact they benefited by going along with it will make them persona non Grata (temporarily at least) within England rugby
Pasty_Spumante-
This is a big question. I'm not sure about 'clearly in on it' - it doesn't sound like they were extravagantly over the cap (i.e. you read numbers like £500k or so, which is only 1/14 of the cap) so they might have assumed they were close but not over. The big question - and the massive frustration about the current non-publication of the report into this - is how the 'co-investments' worked with the chairman and what the players were told about these. If they were assured that this creative accounting was outwith the salary cap then it may be reasonable that the players are, at worst, guilty of a selective deafness to the issue and shouldn't be burnt at the stake. I mean, they must have looked around their changing room and wondered how they had SUCH a stronger squad than everyone else, but then when such a high proportion came through their development routes maybe that's not such a hard story to sell yourself.
Whilst it doesn't justify their 'cheating', lots of rumours going around now that other clubs will currently be sitting very uncomfortably re their own salary cap compliance and creative accounting...
owl
My understanding:
What is interesting, and I haven't read much more about this, is the Exeter owner continuing to be very forthright that no-one should feel any sympathy for them - apparently they've accepted this relegation rather than allow a full forensic accounting of their books and Wray's finances. I'm not entirely sure what his insinuation is, as they've copped for salary cap breaches and 'creative accounting' but I guess this may have been even more egregious than currently portrayed. Or maybe they just didn't want to drag it out any more...