Responding to the news, Labour MP Kevin Brennan, who is a member of the Parliamentary Culture, Media and Sport select committee, “congratulated … The Daily Telegraph for exposing this scandal”.

“The murky world of football finance and dodgy agents should have long since been cleaned up – I hope these convictions and suspensions will also lead to stronger oversight and regulation of this ugly side of the beautiful game”, he said.

The Telegraph published it’s “Football for Sale” investigation in 2016 and over five days revealed allegations of greed and corruption in English football.

One of the stories resulted in Sam Allardyce losing his job as England manager after he was exposed for negotiating a £400,000 business deal. He had only overseen one international match by the time the revelations were published and the allegations led to him agreeing to leave his post “by mutual consent”.

Other stories examined accusations of bribery in English football and led to detectives from the City of London Police Economic Crime Directorate launching a criminal investigation.

Three men exposed in this newspaper appeared in court and – in December 2019 – Price, 50, was found guilty of two counts of paying and facilitating a bribe. Wright, 55, the former assistant manager of Barnsley FC, was convicted on two counts of accepting a bribe.

Price received a suspended 18 month sentence with an unpaid work requirement of 250 hours and a three month curfew, whilst Wright was given a 12 month suspended sentence and ordered to repay the £5,000 payment that he had accepted as a bribe as well as £3,000 in costs by Judge Jeffrey Pegden QC.

‘Brings the game into disrepute’

Price’s business partner, Pagliara, was also found guilty last year of two counts of paying and facilitating a bribe. The FA said it did not investigate Pagliara because he does not fall under the regulator’s remit.

Price was found to have arranged with Pagliara to pay Wright £5,000 in cash, with the promise of another £5,000 to come, in return for encouraging his players to sign with their sports agency, placing their players in the Barnsley first team, arranging a meeting with the owners of the club and supplying confidential information about his players’ contracts.

The bribe was paid in cash by an undercover reporter posing as an executive for a fictitious Far East sports conglomerate set up by this newspaper in 2016 as part of a sting operation, following a tip off about corruption in English football.

The FA has now sanctioned Wright and Price for two breaches of FA Rule E3, which states that: “A participant shall at all times act in the best interests of the game and shall not act in any manner which is improper or brings the game into disrepute.”

Wright has been suspended from all football and football-related activity, except for coaching, for six years and Price has been suspended from all football and football-related activity for nine years.

The independent regulatory commission who imposed the sanctions agreed with the judge in the bribery trial when he said that, from the very first meeting with the undercover journalist, Pagliara and Price  “revealed an awareness of corruption in the football transfer market and a willingness to be involved”.

Wright told the commission his main motivation was  “always the betterment of Barnsley FC and the football league ” and his intentions were  “only to improve Barnsley FC by bringing the best players possible into the club which would not only have strengthened Barnsley FC but also improved the Football League”.

He added that he became involved with the two agents because he  “naïvely believed they had the capabilities to bring such talented footballers to the Championship ” and was  “deeply ashamed of the conversations and meetings that occurred ” when money was discussed.

Although he maintained that taking £5,000 from the undercover journalist was nothing sinister he accepted his behaviour was “stupid” and he was “naïve” for accepting the money and lying to Barnsley FC about it.

Price gave evidence to the commission and made an apology for his “mistakes”. The commission said: “He told the panel he had lost his daughter as a result of his actions and described how the matter had affected him as it had been hanging over him for six years. He said he has suffered for what he described as his ‘horrendous judgment call’.”

This Commission concluded that the two men’s offending had caused “a very serious and lasting detriment to the image of football”.

It added: “There is obviously a need for the sanctions to reflect the severity of the offending, to punish and to deter others from entering into similar enterprises in order to protect the game of football from any similar behaviour in the future and to promote confidence amongst stakeholders and fans of the game.”