The football chief admits role in a husband drugging and raping his wife as she watches in court

Karl Lindsay, 56, who stepped down as chief executive of Taunton Town Football Club before charges were brought against him, pleaded guilty at Manchester's Minshull Street Crown Court to dispatching sedatives to a husband who subsequently drugged and raped his wife, along with two additional serious sexual offences committed over a decade. From her seat in the public gallery, the victim watched Lindsay enter his pleas. He was remanded in custody and will be sentenced once the broader trial concludes.

The woman's husband, a man in his 60s from Stockport who cannot be named, has already admitted 62 offences against her, including multiple counts of rape.

Three other men — Graham Brougham, 74, Keith Fotheringham, 59, and Sean Peers, 38 — have also pleaded guilty to sexual offences against the same woman.

The trial of nine remaining defendants — among them a paramedic, a former nightclub DJ, a football coach who worked with children, and a taxi driver — is due to open on Monday.