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The Leeds United spygate saga has run into a second month, with the EFL confirming on Friday that they required more time to looking into the matter.

An EFL board meeting took place on Thursday and Friday of last week, with many Leeds fans hopeful that there would be some sort of resolution on the matter.

But a statement late on Friday afternoon confirmed that the authorities required more time. The saga began on January 10, 24 hours before Derby lost 2-0 to Marcelo Bielsa's side.

With Leeds United in the dark over any potential punishment, fans were left fuming following the communication, fearing that this uncertainty will hamper their promotion hopes this season.

(Image: Andrew Kearns/CameraSport)

This came after EFL chief executive Shaun Harvey underwent a series of media interviews over the past three weeks, in which he discussed the spygate saga.

The EFL's latest statement

This is the what the EFL released on Friday afternoon:

"At its meeting on Friday afternoon, the EFL Board (*excluding representatives of the Championship) considered the matter of the incident in the vicinity of Derby County’s training ground on Thursday, January 10," their statement said.

"Following a comprehensive review of all available evidence, it was determined that there remain a number of areas that require further exploration and clarification and these investigations will take place at the earliest opportunity.

"An update on this matter will be provided following receipt and analysis of those subsequent enquiries and until this point no further comment will be made."

Harvey on when spygate should be resolved

Here's what Harvey said regarding timeframes when he spoke on talkSPORT on January 25.

"We're not letting it drag on. It's already well underway. We're expecting a response shortly from Leeds and we would look to get the matter clarified and finalised for everybody's benefit as quickly as possible.

"So that's fine, them saying hands up, the thing has to be determined against the rules to see where an independent panel will take any potential punishment. There's no clarity that can be provided positive or negative and the action's happened. It's needs to be dealt with.

"We touched on Wolves last year. This time last year the Wolves issue broke, which we, as the league worked exceptionally quickly to try and get the matter resolved to try and take away any external factors around the promotion race.

"The one commitment that I am able to make to Leeds supporters and indeed the supporters of the other clubs is whatever outcome we are going to get to, we are going to get there as quickly as humanly possible."

And then last week Harvey appeared on Sky Sports News, to say that after Thursday's board meeting, "the whole matter should move fairly swiftly from there".

How long did the Wolves case take to resolve?

Harvey was quick to point to what he described the 'exceptionally quickly' way that the EFL resolved the Wolves case last season. But how long did that take?

As a fresher, concerns were raised by Leeds United and a host of other Championship clubs over the club's involvement with agent Jorge Mendes, whose agency Gestifute was partly owned by Wolves owners Fosun.

Clubs first called for an inquiry in the first week of March, with the EFL releasing a statement on April 25 confirming they had concluded their investigation and confirmed that Mendes had no official role with the club and was therefore not a 'relevant person' in terms of passing the Owners' and Directors' tests.

This whole case took around eight weeks to conclude.

How have previous spying cases been resolved?

The EFL have not previously dealt with a case of this matter, with the nearest precedent being a Premier League investigation after Cardiff City alleged that their side had been leaked to Crystal Palace ahead of a relegation six-pointer in April 2014.

While the Bluebirds wanted their 3-0 defeat to be overturned, the Premier League merely issued the Eagles with a fine, believed to be £25,000.

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