Saints are accused of breaking two rules:
EFL Regulation 3.4, which requires golf equipment to behave in direction of one another with the utmost good religion; and
EFL Regulation 127, which prohibits any membership from observing, or trying to watch, one other membership’s coaching session inside 72 hours of a scheduled match between the 2 golf equipment.
“Below EFL rules, Southampton would ordinarily have 14 days to answer the fees,” the league’s assertion added.
“Nevertheless, given the character of the matter, the EFL will ask the impartial disciplinary fee to shorten the response interval and to listing a listening to on the earliest alternative.”
Southampton mentioned the membership “acknowledges the assertion issued by the EFL in relation to alleged breaches of EFL rules”.
It added: “We will affirm that we’ll be absolutely cooperating with the league all through this course of.
“Given the continued nature of the matter, the membership is unable to remark any additional at the moment.”
The primary leg of their semi-final takes place at Riverside Stadium on Saturday (12:30 BST), with the return at St Mary’s on Tuesday.
The rule in opposition to spying was introduced in seven years in the past after Leeds United were fined £200,000 by the EFL for watching opponents prepare earlier than matches.
A member of Leeds’ workers was discovered appearing suspiciously outdoors Derby’s coaching floor earlier than a fixture between the 2 sides on 10 January 2019.
Supervisor Marcelo Bielsa revealed he had despatched a member of workers to observe coaching classes of each group Leeds had performed that season.
The EFL discovered Leeds breached guidelines over treating groups with “good religion”.
