Hatters CEO doesn't believe points deductions for Everton and Forest are enough to 'fit the crime'

Luton chief executive Gary Sweet has criticised the punishments handed out to both Everton and Nottingham Forest for breaching Premier League profit and sustainability rules in recent weeks as ones that aren’t befitting of the crimes committed.

The Toffees had already been hit with a 10 point deduction back in November for losing more than the £105m allowed in three years for the 2021-22 period, which was reduced to six on appeal back in February. Sean Dyche’s side were then charged again in January after being £16.6m over the £105m permitted for the three-year period to 2022-23, with an independent commission giving them another two point penalty on Monday, a decision that dropped Everton to 27 points, now just two above the Hatters.

Speaking to BBC Three Counties Radio about the situation, Sweet said: "It's quite astonishing really. One of the things that disappoints me is that the independent commission who value the level of the penalty haven't clearly hasn't looked into it too deeply. If you look at what clubs do, we spend hundreds of thousands of pounds in data analytics in order to recruit the right players that are going to give us the goals, give us the points, defend the goals, so we know the value of a goal, we know the value of a point in monetary terms.

"If we know then it is not beyond the wit of man with such important decisions like this for an independent party to come up with that kind of data analysis to be able to value an overspend amount and convert to points - and it is never two, it's never two, it is much higher than two. From that perspective (I am) really disappointed that it is that little. The punishment simply doesn't fit the crime and ultimately what that means is it doesn’t become a deterrent. If you have the money, you might as well spend it.”

Meanwhile, Forest saw their tally for the season reduced by four points last month, as they were £34.5m over the £61m threshold for the 2022-23 period, altered due to spending two years in the Championship. It was again something that Sweet didn’t think was enough, as he continued: “If you look at the Forest four (points), which I was also disappointed with, it should have been six. If you look at the Forest situation, there is a clear identifier there, Chris Wood, who cost them roughly 15 million pounds and cost them another five million pounds in terms of salaries, so a twenty million pound part of their overspend, about half of their overspend.

"In the two games that we've had against them, he has scored all three goals and taken four points from us and given them two. That is a six point turnaround, just in those two games, forget what else he’s done, he scored on Sunday (at Spurs) as well, effectively constitutes what kind of level of points deduction they should be given and that's only half their overspend, so it should be an awful lot more than four points in my view.”

With both Everton and Forest earning points back for cooperating with the independent commission, the Reds after ‘early admission and exceptional cooperation’, it is something that sticks in the throat of Sweet, especially as he saw Luton deducted a massive 30 points at the start of the 2008-09 season which ultimately cost them their place in the Football League.

They didn’t benefit from any leniency on that occasion though, as the CEO added: “In the commissions report, they kind of allude to the fact that on the first time that a club breaches the rules it won't be dealt with relatively lightly, but if they're deemed to cooperate, they will get that deduction. But this is Everton's second time, albeit a smaller level, so it should certainly be a greater amount.

"Getting two points off for cooperating is ridiculous. You should have had two points added if you didn't cooperate. It is not for me to say how many that should be, but as a club that has gone through a 30-point deduction for what I can see is something I see as relatively less, then it is somewhere between the two. It has to be a punishment level which actually is a real deterrent."