Flambouyant football boss George Reynolds has been hit with a industrial tribunal fine far larger than originally believed, it has emerged.

The multi-millionaire chairman of Darlington FC has been ordered to pay a former employee more than £61,000 after she was sacked when she had an affair with a director.

Originally it was believed that the fine was £12,400 for breach of contract.

But the panel has also awarded her a further £48,789 compensation.

Ex-commercial manager Helen Coverdale took Mr Reynolds to an employment tribunal after she was fired from Third Division Darlington.

The club chairman last night vowed to fight the decision, claiming it was a ''disgrace'' and added that veterans injured in the Falklands War had not received as much.

Miss Coverdale rowed with the wife of former club director Mike Metcalf, with whom she was having an affair, at half-time during a game.

At a tribunal in October last year chipboard magnate Mr Reynolds claimed the affair had tarnished the small club's family image and told the panel in Newcastle that she had performed badly in her job.

But in December the tribunal found in favour of Miss Coverdale, ruling she had been unfairly dismissed. The amount of compensation Mr Reynolds must pay was disclosed today.

Miss Coverdale, 34, was awarded £12,400 for breach of contract as she claimed she had not been paid commission on the business she brought to the club.

The panel awarded her a further £48,789 compensation for unfair dismissal after she left her post of two years, which paid a salary of £18,000.

In a written judgment, the panel said they had considered reducing the compensation by £11,000 the amount she was paid for selling her story to a national newspaper but the tribunal decided that would not have been fair after the case had generated ''substantial and somewhat salacious publicity''.

At the panel hearing in October last year, the tribunal heard how Miss Coverdale was passing the directors' lounge at the club's Feethams ground when her lover's wife, Michelle Metcalf, grabbed her and told her to stop the affair.

Mr Metcalf has since left the club and is understood to be having a relationship with Miss Coverdale.

Mr Reynolds, a former safecracker who went straight many years ago to become a chipboard magnate, and was recently listed as Britain's 112th richest man, claimed tribunals created unemployment and said non-playing staff at the club now worked without contract.

He said today: ''In my opinion the tribunal was a disgrace and a miscarriage of justice. We are going to appeal.

''There're people who fought in the Falklands War who didn't get as much as that. There's something wrong with the system.''

Miss Coverdale was unavailable for comment today but after the tribunal ruled in December that she had won she said: ''I'm pleased I won and I'm also pleased that they found I didn't to any extent contribute to my dismissal.''