Managers and club officials were breathing a little easier last night after effectively being exonerated of any wrongdoing at the end of a nine-month investigation into football’s so-called bung culture. Lord Stevens of Kirkwhelpington said that he had found no evidence of illegal payments, but hinted that some agents were engaged in “crooked” activities.

However, within hours, the FA Premier League, which commissioned the report, was entangled in a fresh controversy when it was claimed that it had put Stevens under pressure to water down his recommendations.

A memo from Richard Scudamore, the Premier League chief executive, which was sent to all 20 club chairmen, appeared to suggest that the league had tried to persuade Stevens to take clubs’ concerns on board.

The memo, obtained by Channel 4 News, reads: “. . . in respect of the (Stevens) recommendations we did feed back in the strongest terms the sentiments expressed by clubs in our meeting on November 9.

“It would appear that these have been taken on board . . . save for the concern regarding the agents of managers not being allowed to act for players at the same club. Lord Stevens was not for turning on this and we will have to consider it in due course.”

When the Stevens report was released yesterday, it was suggested to Scudamore that a cynic might say the league and the FA had tried to have it watered down. Scudamore replied: “Certainly the FA and ourselves have had no discussions about the wording of this report. It’s Lord Stevens’s report.” Stevens added: “I can vouch for that.”

The Premier League insists that the report has not been “shaped in any way” by them, but it is understood that it did pass on “advice” after the clubs had been shown the former Metropolitan Police Commissioner’s observations at their meeting in November.

Responding to the claims broadcast last night, a Premier League spokesman said: “The Premier League clubs have had no opportunity to water down the Stevens report or his recommendations. They received them today.”

Stevens’s Quest team have cleared 345 of the 362 transfers they were charged with investigating and have asked for more time to look into the remaining 17. The delay is a result of eight agents refusing to co-operate with their inquiries, Stevens said, but he refused to name them, the transfers involved or the three clubs he found to be unfamiliar with transfer regulations.

Details of some of the transfers still under investigation have been forwarded to the police — the Serious Fraud Office is believed to have been contacted in at least one case — as well as the Inland Revenue and tax authorities.

The Premier League has granted the extension and will discuss the report’s 39 recommendations at its shareholders meeting on February 8.

“This is under 5 per cent of the transactions under review and does not indicate criminal, endemic wrongdoing across the whole of the Premier League,” Stevens said. “The game, in relation to the majority of what we have seen, is clean, but the accounting processes and monitoring of the clubs is in a mess.”

Scudamore defended the failure to name names and accepted the report’s findings. “There are criticisms of the clubs, the Premier League and the FA and we will take it on the chin,” he said, “but people will only be named when there is evidence which will lead to a charge.

Stevens painted a picture of a transfer system in a state of chaos, with the FA’s compliance unit having little control over ignorant clubs and lawless agents. His solutions are also familiar, such as forcing players to pay agents, although the notion of a manager’s agent being banned from representing players at the same club is new. He said it was essential that every one of his 39 recommendations was implemented.