Souness was Newcastle boss when Boumsong moved from Rangers

And Scottish agent Willie McKay has been criticised for a lack of information given to the Quest team.

Stevens reported "inconsistencies in evidence" provided by Souness.

McKay and Souness were involved in the �8m transfer of Jean-Alain Boumsong from Rangers to Newcastle in 2005 - one of 17 mentioned in the report.

BBC Scotland report: Stevens Report

Deals involving Chelsea, Middlesbrough, Bolton, Portsmouth and Newcastle have been put in the spotlight by Lord Stevens.

But he stated that there was no evidence of irregular payments to club officials or players.

Souness, who was Newcastle manager at the time of Boumsong's transfer from Rangers, issued a statement through his solicitors.

I volunteered full information to Quest as a witness Graeme Souness

"I cannot understand why my name features in this report," he said.

"I volunteered full information to Quest as a witness and I have heard nothing further from them."

Newcastle stressed the report had made clear that club officials had done nothing wrong "and have at all times offered their full co-operation".

Quest stated that the transfers of Boumsong and Amady Faye involved payments to McKay, one of 15 agents mentioned in the report.

And, despite "a degree of co-operation" from the agent, the inquiry was still awaiting clarification in relation to various documents provided by him.

Clarification from McKay was also cited as a reason for refusing to sign off the transfers of Benjani Mwaruwari and Aliou Cisse to Portsmouth.

But Portsmouth have insisted that McKay received no agent's fee for the Benjani deal and the "normal agent's fee" for that of Cisse.

The inquiry recommended that the Football Association in England and world governing body Fifa continue to investigate and that further powers are used to ensure co-operation.

Lord Stevens also recommended that inquiries should continue into McKay registering a horse in Portsmouth manager Harry Redknapp's name.

However, the report states that this was "no evidence that this transaction is related to any specific transfer".

And Redknapp has stressed that this was "purely a PR exercise" and resulted in no material gain or reward for himself.

That view has been backed by trainer Dandy Nicholls.

McKay has so far declined to comment on Lord Stevens' report.

Lord Stevens said: "Many lessons have been learned and strict adherence to and enforcement of the recommendations should ensure that the game and the transfer market can proceed in an untainted and transparent manner."

The Premier League will now send the findings to the FA and Fifa.

Meanwhile, the Scottish Football Association said it would not be making any comment on Stevens' findings until it had received a copy of the full report.

The Scottish Premier League said it would discuss the report "informally" on Monday at a strategy meeting.

The 17 transfers 'uncleared':