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Articles about football clubs facing or going into administration.
Truro City Football Club has been suspended from the Football Conference and is now likely to be liquidated. The football authorities bent over backwards to help the club, extending the final deadline by half an hour. But although the club was able to produce a £10,000 bond from Cornwall County Council to fund its next run of games, this was well short of the £50,000 the Conference required.
The Southern League have announced that tomorrow’s game between Kettering Town and Bideford Town is off given that the electricity has been cut off at Nene Park. Meanwhile, Leamington chairman Jim Scott is claiming that they could lose thousands if the Poppies go under. Their match with Kettering was called off on Tuesday.
It may seem a bit like the condemned man who has become a fixture on death row being given another short stay of execution, but the latest news about Truro City does offer a slim hope that they might escape extinction.
Truro City FC have been given until 5 p.m. on Thursday to satisfy the Conference that they can see out the season or they will be removed from the Blue Square South. The club has asked that the criteria be kept confidential for reasons of commercial sensitivity. City’s players have not been paid for several weeks.
The administrator of Port Vale, Bob Young of Begbies Traynor, is hopeful that a deal that can take the club out of administration will be agreed in October. Three contenders have emerged to buy the club with others in the wings.
In March Lancashire businessman Keith Ryder was named as preferred bidder with a proposed £1.3m deal. When it collapsed last month, the administrator said that he had never known this to happen at such an advanced and late stage.
A fifth formal bid has been made for Portsmouth by Portco Ltd., a group of UK investors fronted by Scottish businessman Harry Kerr. Kerr is the director of a successful financial services company called Avalon and is a fan of Hibernian and Arsenal.
The group has produced proof of funds. It is believed that they are interested in the ‘sleeping giant’ potential of the club and the possibility of redeveloping Fratton Park. That is, however, linked with 10 acres of car park and office space to the north and west of the stadium.
A new bid to acquire Portsmouth FC has been submitted by former Watford owner Laurence Bassini. However, it has come late in the day and is not seen as a ‘game changer’.
Truro City has put out a desperate appeal to fans to come to the game on Saturday so it can continue to operate. The administrators in charge of the club said the gate receipts were its only income.
Rumours of a bid by a Middle East consortium for Pompey have been confirmed. They will need to put a credible bid together quickly, as the other two bidders, former owner Balram Chainrai and Portsmouth Supporters’ Trust, have been given until this Friday to finalise their bids.
Truro City have been placed into administration, but the move may have come too late and the club could disappear. They face a winding up order in the High Court tomorrow from Revenue and Customs for £15,000 before costs and the patience of the tax authorities is running out.
Meanwhile, the club’s players are turning out for free to aid its battle for survival. However, they said they would not turn out for yesterday’s match against Boreham Wood (which they won 2-0) unless steps were taken to place the club in administration.