Tonda Eckert 'deserves a second chance' – Dragan Solak

Southampton owner Dragan Solak says he will not sack Tonda Eckert, despite the "mistake" the head coach made when authorising a spying campaign against rival Championship clubs.

"I think he deserves a second chance and I would give it to him," the Serb businessman told BBC Sport in an exclusive interview.

"My full support would be behind him actually, because I think he's a super-talented manager."

After a short spell as caretaker boss, Eckert was appointed on a permanent basis in December to lead a Southampton side who were involved in a relegation fight. He guided them not only to safety but to the Championship promotion play-offs after a fourth-place finish.

However, Saints were expelled from the play-offs after admitting observing opponents' training sessions, and they have been deducted four points for the 2026-27 season.

An independent disciplinary commission said that Eckert, the club's 33-year-old German boss, accepted he had orchestrated what it called a "contrived and determined plan from the top down".

On Monday, it was revealed that a junior member of staff claimed that Eckert's proposals had placed them "under extreme pressure" to carry out a task they were uncomfortable with and felt was morally wrong.

Details emerged after the publication of the written reasons of an arbitration panel appointed to hear Southampton's appeal against their punishment. Eckert was said to be "surprised" to learn that EFL regulations prohibited the practice.

"I believe Tonda that he didn't know that it was the rule that he was breaking," said Solak, whose media company acquired a majority stake of the club in 2022.

"My personal opinion, and the opinion of the board, is that he is a manager who deserves to be backed by us and to be supported by us. I will obviously seek advice from the team. I will seek advice from the players, from the fans. But yes, if it's ultimately my decision, he stays."

Speaking from Slovenia, Solak added: "In Italy or in Germany, where Tonda was working, this is basically common practice that nobody cares about."

However, Solak said he also issued Eckert with a warning. "I told him: 'You almost broke my heart. You do it again, you'll kill me. The next time I see you in July, if you don't know the EFL book of rules by heart, you can't work for me. Because, we can't have another mistake.'

"I truly hope that he will learn from this experience and he will achieve an incredible career."

Tonda Eckert's job at Southampton appears safe for now at least

Southampton admitted to charges of spying on Oxford United and Ipswich Town in the regular season, and then Middlesbrough before the play-off semi-final. The Football Association is investigating the scandal and could yet decide to charge Eckert.

When asked what he would do if Eckert was eventually banned by the governing body, Solak said: "I can support him even if he's banned, but I can't make him manage if he's banned. My support comes from a very simple legal situation where there is no double jeopardy.

"Whatever crime you did, you can be sentenced only once. I think we were 'over-sentenced'. The punishment that the club received was severe and completely disproportionate to the mistake that we made. We lost our chance to win £200m.

"But if they're going to go again and then double that with [a] ban, we might appeal. But he will have my support through the process. But if he's banned, he's banned. I mean, I can't put somebody to manage the club if he is not allowed.

"I'm looking at him as a young, extremely talented manager – the guy who took our club when we were 21st in the table and brought us almost to direct promotion. I am amazed that Tonda is willing to come back in this hostile environment after the witch hunt he had in the media.

"I'm pretty sure if the FA decides to ban him, he will get a triple better-paid job in Italy or Germany."

When asked if it was fair to call it just "a mistake" when, under Eckert, Southampton had spied on three rivals, Solak said, "It was three times out of 46 games. If he would do it on an industrial level, he would do it on every game. Right?"

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Southampton expelled from play-offs for spying

In a wide-ranging interview, Solak insisted he had been unaware of the spying plot, revealing he only found out about it when the news broke last month on social media.

"I actually learned from X. I sent a message: 'What the hell is this?'

"Even people I talked to at the highest level of the club didn't have a clue what was going on. They really thought it was a joke."

Describing the punishment Southampton received as "ridiculous", Solak tried to downplay the seriousness of the club's cheating.

"Yes, we tried to obtain an information that was not legally allowed," he said. "OK, what you do with this information and how you use it on the pitch, is a different thing. And what is the direct influence of this information on the pitch?

"On the other side, we can see on almost every game, players diving, trying to basically get a penalty or get a red card. That is not fair. And it's very simple to call this cheating because they know what they're doing, it's much, much more direct influence on the game and the result than whatever we did.

"I'm not saying that what we did is right. I agree with the league that they want to stop it once for all. I just think that they are not treating every offence equally."

Asked how he felt about the club staff, other than Eckert, who were aware of the spying, Solak said: "This whole thing was happening within the environment of our analysts.

"I think we have a couple of guys that are foreign analysts, so for them you could say probably that they didn't have a clue that this was against the rules.

"And then we have probably five or six British analysts. How come they either didn't know or they didn't tell? I don't know. But this is something that will be additional soul-searching for us… I am definitely very focused that we come to the understanding of this because this is the only way it will never happen again."

The EFL's commission said it was "deplorable" of the club to have used junior staff members to "conduct the clandestine observations".

Solak admitted that such a culture was "unacceptable", but he blamed "a huge amount of misunderstanding, ignorance and arrogance, we have dysfunctions in the club, but we will actually make an effort for people to understand that whoever orders them to do something, that is putting them out of their comfort zone, they have every right to refuse".

When asked about the analyst intern who had been sent to spy on opposition training sessions, and who had been caught doing so at Middlesbrough, Solak said: "I don't see really this culture when somebody is really making junior staff do something they don't want.

"I believe that our junior intern felt personally it's wrong, and he didn't feel right for doing this, and I think he should have expressed that stronger. I'm pretty sure that if [he had] come to us, the top management, actually it would be the seniors who would be punished, not him.

"I have a lot of pity. I'm sorry for what he had to go through. And we obviously would like him to stay in the club and we offered him a prolonged job with the club."

Solak also said that had the intern spied on Middlesbrough when Eckert had wanted, EFL rules banning the practice up to 72 hours before a match would not have been breached.

"Tonda, not directly, through somebody, told them to go to Middlesbrough on Monday, just to check whether one player is fit or not," Solak said.

"If they [went] when they were told, actually, it wouldn't be an offence. It would be outside of 72 hours. They decided not to go… so they left three days later, [and] went straight into the forbidden time.

"But one

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The family of murdered student, Henry Nowak, said they will carry their grief "every single day" for the rest of their lives and have called on the government to treat knife crime as a "national emergency".

It comes after Vickrum Digwa, 23, was sentenced to life in prison, for a minimum of 21 years, for using a 21cm (8in) blade he said he carried as part of his Sikh faith to stab the 18-year-old in Southampton in December.

Digwa had lied to police about being the victim of a racist attack and officers arrested and handcuffed Nowak as he lay dying on the ground.

The student's family called his treatment by police "inhumane and degrading". Hampshire police has apologised.

The Hampshire and Isle of Wight Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) Donna Jones said she had written to the prime minster calling for an "urgent review on the carrying of bladed articles for religious and ceremonial purposes".

Jones added that: "It was a stressful situation, but mistakes were made and that needs to be uncovered. My job is not to be here to defend the police, my job is to ensure the police are doing what they should be doing."

The Home Office has been approached for comment.

Bodycam footage released by the force, with the family's permission, shows officers arriving at the scene and speaking to Digwa and others.

Judge William Mousley KC told Southampton Crown Court he was sure that Nowak had not said anything racist to the Sikh man who killed him.

And before sentencing Digwa, he told him his actions had "stirred up racial tension in Southampton and across the country which has made many Sikhs worried about their safety".

Warning: This story contains details some may find upsetting

Henry's older sister, Olivia Nowak, called her brother, from Chafford Hundred in Essex, her "best friend" and said they had "an unbreakable bond" in a statement she read out in court about how his death has changed her life.

She said: "The day we got the knock on the door to say my brother had passed, I don't think there are any words to describe that type of pain. A lot of myself died when he died.

"Henry was the most wonderful, funny, handsome, kind, precious, smart boy. He lit every room he walked in.

"As the eldest of four siblings, watching my younger brothers and sisters grieve the loss of their big brother is a pain layered on top of my own.

"Whenever I'm having a hard day, the only place I want to be is at Henry's grave.

"It is the place where the reality of his loss hits the hardest but the only place I am close to him.

"I feel sad for those who never got to experience life with Henry, even though it was short. If you had known Henry, you would never had hurt him."

A statement written by Henry's mother, Lucy Ross, was read out by prosecutors.

It said: "Being told that your son has died is something no one can ever truly comes to terms with. The circumstances were so tragic and unimaginable that the pain is beyond anything I knew existed."

She said Henry had been the first grandchild of her elderly parents to go to university and it was a moment that had "filled all of us with immense pride".

She described Henry as "ambitious, determined, and full of life" and said "there will always be a hole in our hearts that can never be repaired".

Katie Woodcock, Henry's stepmother, told the court: "I replay the horrors of that night over again. It keeps me awake at night."

She described watching Henry's dad, Mark Nowak "unable to stand" and hearing his "raw, unfiltered sobs" echoing through the house, after the police told them Henry had been stabbed and had died.

She also recalled how she had found one of her children, aged 10, "curled up at the top of stairs, alone and frightened", having "found out in the worst way possible" through overheard conversations.

Henry had joined the family at a pantomime days before he was killed and she said: "We waved him off back to Southampton university, back to the city that was not safe for him."

She described going to clear out Henry's room at university and finding his advent calendar with only the first three doors open, "that broke me," she added.

In the family statement read out after Digwa's sentencing, Mark Nowak said despite the "shocking actions" of the police on the "fateful night" Henry died, his family wanted to express their "heartfelt gratitude" to the murder investigation team.

"They secured justice for our son and for that our family will be forever grateful," he said.

He also thanked the family's police liaison officers and their legal team.

Temporary Deputy Chief Constable Robert France said he was sorry Henry had been arrested and handcuffed.

The force also promised to act on recommendations made by the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC), which is investigating officers' actions.

PCC Jones said: "At the moment in this country, Vickrum Digwa carrying that knife, it was lawful for him to do that as long as he carried it in a sheath, which he did, as a Sikh gentlemen he is able to carry that knife.

"While the Sikh Federation have come out and condemned what he did and said that wasn't a Kirpan – a much smaller knife carried around the neck – the one that Digwa was carrying was a longer, bigger knife.

"I think we need greater clarity that's why I have written to the prime minister."

Sir Keir Starmer commented on the case in a post on X, where he said: "This an awful, shocking case.

"We must end the cycle of tragedy by tackling the horror of knife crime."

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Chinese authorities have taken aim at a new target as they rein in the country's cut-throat food delivery industry: "ghost kitchens", or restaurants that don't actually exist but appear on apps.

The "ghost kitchens" outsource orders to third-party vendors, which fulfill them at lower costs, allowing merchants to push down prices and maximise profits.

Authorities have found thousands of these "ghost kitchens" across China, raising concerns that the cheap prices are coming at the cost of food safety.

Starting this week, apps must verify restaurants' licences and addresses, while merchants must ensure the listing online matches the physical business and specify if it offers dine-in services.

The scrutiny of "ghost kitchens" began last year, after a man in Beijing lodged a complaint over an unsatisfactory cake topped with inedible flowers. He had ordered it on a food delivery app, state media reported.

Officials found that the cake chain he had ordered from listed nearly 380 locations on major e-commerce platforms but did not have a single physical store. Its online shops also allegedly used forged business licences.

As the investigation continued, it revealed that the chain accepted orders which were then transferred to a different platform – and that is where the orders were outsourced to various third-party vendors, depending on who had the lowest bid.

Authorities found a total of 3.6 million cake orders across two order-transfer platforms, state news agency Xinhua reported last month.

They also recorded 67,000 "ghost shops" across seven major food delivery apps, which together with the order-transfer sites "formed an illegal supply chain through mutual collusion", according to Xinhua.

Food delivery platforms were complicit in these arrangements, it added. "If we're too strict in our review, the merchants would go to other platforms," a staff member from one delivery app reportedly told officials.

Online food delivery is a fiercely competitive industry in China.

Last year, a price war among major delivery apps led to government warnings about a race to the bottom. Bearing the brunt of ever-speedier takeouts are delivery riders scrambling to meet tight deadlines for a pittance.

In April, the State Administration for Market Regulation said that they have fined seven e-commerce platforms – including Taobao, JD.com, Meituan and Pinduoduo – a total of 3.6bn yuan ($530m; £400m), mostly over deliveries from "ghost kitchens".

As the campaign against "ghost kitchens" continues, merchants are trying to assure consumers of food safety.

According to a Xinhua report, more than 20 takeout stalls in the eastern city of Hangzhou have installed "transparent kitchens" with live broadcasting features, allowing consumers to view food preparation in real time.

In nearby Anhui province, authorities announced last week that they have signed a food safety agreement with Meituan, Taobao and JD.com, which includes using AI models to monitor kitchens and rewarding delivery riders for whistleblowing on illegal restaurants.

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