A former chairman of Watford has been banned for life from the English game after admitting supplying falsified financial information to the football authorities.

Raffaele Riva has been punished for submitting a forged banking letter - the existence of which was exclusively revealed by the Daily Telegraph almost two years ago - when Gino Pozzo became the club’s sole owner.

The faked filing, provided as proof Pozzo had enough funds to bankroll Watford, allowed the Italian to take full control of the Hertfordshire club.

The Premier League side were fined almost £4 million in August after admitting providing a letter fabricated to appear as though it was written by HSBC, one of the world’s largest banks, to the Football League (now EFL) shortly before their 2014-15 promotion-winning campaign.

A copy of the document was obtained by the Telegraph, which it passed on both to HSBC and the police after alerting the EFL, sparking an internal investigation by Watford and a 10-month inquiry by the governing body.

The club pleaded guilty to filing the letter and were fined £3.95m - the largest ever EFL financial penalty - by a disciplinary commission and ordered to pay an additional £350,000 in costs.