The IFR has opened an investigation: what a football club must and should do in the first 14 days
An IFR investigation can trigger immediate legal obligations, but the Football Governance Act 2025 does not create a general 14-day deadline running from the day an investigation opens. The IFR must normally give the suspected person an investigation notice as soon as reasonably practicable, although it may delay that notice if giving it would prejudice the investigation. The separate statutory minimum of 14 days begins only if the IFR later gives a warning notice because it is minded to take enforcement action. This guide therefore uses the first fortnight as a practical mobilisation period, while distinguishing what the law requires from what good response practice recommends.
The preservation duty can arise before an investigation notice
Section 72 applies to any person who knows or suspects that a section 68 investigation is being, or is likely to be, conducted. Without reasonable excuse, that person must not destroy or dispose of, falsify or conceal relevant information, or cause or permit any of those things. Relevant information is information the person knows or suspects is or would be relevant to the investigation.
Knowledge or suspicion is a question of fact. The IFR’s final Information Gathering and Enforcement Guidance says it may arise through an investigation notice, information from someone else or another indirect route; it also says that knowing someone has complained to the IFR about a possible relevant infringement is likely to amount to suspicion that an investigation is likely. By contrast, a standalone section 65 information request does not necessarily mean that the IFR suspects non-compliance or is considering enforcement. Clubs should escalate the facts promptly rather than assume either conclusion.
The preservation duty does not necessarily wait for an investigation notice. Once the section 72 knowledge-or-suspicion threshold is met, relevant information must not be destroyed, disposed of, falsified or concealed without reasonable excuse.
Day one: document preservation, done properly
Whether the trigger is an investigation notice or fact-specific knowledge or suspicion under section 72, the first response should be a controlled preservation process. The IFR advises taking a broad view of relevance, including material that may tend to prove or disprove the suspected infringement.
Issue a targeted preservation instruction promptly. It should reach everyone reasonably likely to control relevant information—not only people named in a notice—and identify the subject matter, custodians, systems and date range in scope. Consider email, messaging platforms, collaboration tools, mobile devices, physical records, backups and system-generated data. Preserve originals and metadata, and keep a record of the steps taken.
Suspend relevant routine deletion and retention cycles. The IFR says that, once a person knows an investigation has opened or is likely to open, it expects routine deletion or destruction of information known or suspected to be relevant to be suspended pending discussion. In those circumstances, the IFR is unlikely to treat continuing automated destruction under a retention policy as a reasonable excuse. That is more precise than saying every accidental deletion automatically amounts to a breach: the statutory knowledge-or-suspicion, relevance and reasonable-excuse questions still matter.
Communicate the duty to the relevant people. Section 72 applies to a ‘person’, not only to the club as a corporate entity, so owners, officers, employees or others who meet its factual trigger can be affected individually. The club should explain the hold clearly, provide a route for questions and monitor compliance rather than assume a single email has solved the issue.
Privilege: what can genuinely be withheld, and what cannot
Section 73 provides a statutory protection for privileged communications. Part 7 does not authorise the IFR, an IFR officer or an expert reporter to require production of, take possession of, or copy a communication that would be protected by legal professional privilege in High Court proceedings. The definition covers qualifying communications between a professional legal adviser and client, and qualifying communications made in connection with or in contemplation of legal proceedings and for those proceedings. The Act preserves separate seizure provisions under the Criminal Justice and Police Act 2001, so specialist advice is essential if a warrant is involved.
Privilege should be assessed document by document; copying a lawyer or labelling a document ‘privileged’ does not create the protection. The IFR may require confirmation that responsive material has been withheld, an explanation of the review process and a privilege log in non-privileged terms. Commercial or personal sensitivity is not itself a lawful reason to withhold responsive information. Sensitivity should nevertheless be identified and explained when material is submitted, because the IFR says it will consider confidentiality, potential harm and possible redaction, anonymisation or aggregation before further disclosure.
Governance: clear authority, accurate reporting and usable records
The Act does not prescribe a particular investigation committee or require a named response lead. Those are governance choices, not statutory duties. They are nevertheless sensible ways to support the clear decision-making authority, accountability and oversight expected by the IFR’s Football Club Corporate Governance Code.
Brief the board accurately. The board should receive a factual account of the notice or other trigger, the scope of the known issue, immediate legal obligations, deadlines, preservation steps, key uncertainties and any decisions required. Avoid speculation and false reassurance; clearly separate established facts from matters still being investigated.
Establish clear ownership and decision rights. A senior response lead can coordinate legal, compliance, IT, finance, communications and operational work, with documented escalation routes and authority limits. That does not displace the board’s role or an individual’s need for separate advice where interests may diverge.
Keep contemporaneous records of decisions, actions and outstanding items. The Club Code recommends accurate minutes recording decisions, dissent, actions and timescales. Such records do not automatically establish a reasonable excuse, but they can evidence what the club actually did. This matters because the IFR’s Sanctions Guidance treats failure to cooperate as potentially aggravating and consistent cooperation and prompt remediation as potentially mitigating.
Interviews: distinguish compulsory notices from voluntary meetings
Once an investigation is open, Schedule 8 allows the IFR to require an individual—not necessarily the suspected person—to attend and answer questions at an interview. The IFR will give a notice describing the investigation and specifying the time, place and manner of interview and the possible consequences of non-compliance. Formal interviews will usually be recorded; the individual may ask to have a legal adviser present and should receive a transcript or note to check. The IFR may also invite a person to a voluntary meeting. Clubs and individuals should clarify which process is being used, preserve applicable privilege and consider whether separate representation is needed; they should not assume an informal invitation is compulsory or inconsequential.
Why 14 days matters and what it does not mean
Section 76 applies when the IFR is minded to take action under section 75 and Schedule 9. Before taking that action, it must issue a warning notice describing the proposed action and reasons, inviting representations and specifying how and when to make them. The representation period must be at least 14 days beginning with the day the warning notice is given, and the IFR must consider representations received in accordance with the notice before issuing its decision notice. The IFR may allow longer in an appropriate case.
That period is not a guaranteed runway between the opening of an investigation and a warning notice. The IFR’s final Guidance says there is no fixed period for issuing a warning notice after an investigation opens, and in some cases it may issue the warning notice at the same time as the investigation notice. Investigations may otherwise run for different lengths depending on the evidence needed. A first-fortnight plan is therefore useful because it mobilises preservation, governance, privilege review and evidence gathering quickly—not because the Act always gives a club 14 days before anything else happens.
For the detail of the IFR’s section 65 Information Notice and section 66 Expert Reporter powers, see Lagom’s existing guides to those provisions. For what may follow a warning notice, including sanctions, a decision notice, internal review and an appeal to the Competition Appeal Tribunal where available, see Lagom’s enforcement and appeals guidance.
The strongest investigation response starts when the preservation duty arises, keeps legal duties separate from recommended governance steps, and does not mistake the warning-notice period for an investigation timetable.
Lagom Sports Compliance is the leading specialist governance, risk, compliance and anti-financial crime consultancy built exclusively for professional football, globally. We support clubs through IFR licensing and IFR enforcement —from preservation and privilege workflows, governance and interview preparation through to an evidenced warning-notice response within the applicable period. If your club has received an IFR notice, has facts suggesting that an investigation may be likely, or wants to build its response capability in advance, get in touch.
For licensing, we offer:
Review Only support for clubs preparing their own application who want an independent, criterion-by-criterion review before submission;
Part Support for clubs that want to lead certain work-streams while we own others; and
Full Support, where a named senior consultant leads the entire licensing project from readiness assessment through to post-submission.
For ODSE specifically, we help CEOs and their leadership teams map exactly who in the organisation is in scope, assess individual readiness against the fitness and source of wealth tests, and build the material change notification process that keeps you compliant for as long as you hold the role, not just at the point of your original determination. If any of the concerns above sound genuinely familiar, get in touch and we will talk through what the right level of support looks like for your specific position.
We have also built a self service IFR readiness assessment tool. It takes around 15 minutes to complete and gives you a guide as to what you may need to, based on what you already have in place.
Frequently asked questions: the first response to an IFR investigation
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Potentially, yes. Section 72 applies where a person knows or suspects that a section 68 investigation is being, or is likely to be, conducted. Without reasonable excuse, that person must not destroy, dispose of, falsify or conceal relevant information, or cause or permit those things. Whether the threshold is met and whether information is relevant are questions of fact; a standalone information request does not by itself prove that an enforcement investigation is under way.
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Yes, where the material falls within section 73’s definition of a privileged communication. The IFR may ask for an explanation of the review method and a privilege log describing withheld material in non-privileged terms. Commercial or personal sensitivity is not, by itself, a reason to withhold responsive information, although the club should identify and explain genuine confidentiality concerns so the IFR can consider safeguards around any further disclosure.
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At least 14 days beginning with the day on which the warning notice is given. The notice must specify the actual period and method for representations, and the IFR may allow longer depending on the circumstances. This is the minimum period for responding to proposed enforcement action; it is not a general 14-day deadline triggered when an investigation opens.
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A failure, without reasonable excuse, to comply with section 72 can lead to an IFR censure statement or financial penalty. Section 78 creates separate criminal offences concerning information required to be given under the Act, false or misleading information and obstruction under a warrant. The precise statutory elements must be met; an inadvertent deletion is not automatically a section 78 offence. A person convicted on indictment under section 78 may receive up to two years’ imprisonment, a fine, or both.
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Yes. After opening an investigation, the IFR may issue a formal notice requiring an individual to attend and answer relevant questions. The individual need not be the person suspected of the infringement. The notice will set the time, place and manner and explain the consequences of non-compliance; the interviewee may ask to have a legal adviser present. The IFR may also invite voluntary meetings, which should be distinguished from a compulsory interview notice.