The Football Association is coming under increasing pressure to investigate claims by former Premier League referee Mark Halsey that he was pressured into changing his view of an incident so a player could be sanctioned.
The claims, supported by similar allegations made in Halsey's autobiography three years ago, directly implicate professional referees' chief Mike Riley and senior FA official Tarik Shamel.
Privately the FA were contesting Halsey's version of events last night but publicly they would only say 'The FA compliance team deal with all disciplinary matters with the utmost integrity' — in what appeared to be an alarming failure to recognise the serious nature of the claims.