A deal has been agreed for the buy-out of Scunthorpe United Football Club.
A local consortium headed by former director and car dealership executive Simon Elliott and filmmaker Ian Sharp has reached terms with owner Peter Swann.
The club is currently in the National League relegation zone, having dropped out of the English Football League last season, and on the worst run of form in the division. Former player and interim manager Tony Daws walked away from the role following last weekend's defeat.
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Mr Swann, who has been subject to protests over his tenure due to the rapid drop down the ladder, said: “We needed to ensure that the club wages for November were paid as soon as possible, which will happen later today or tomorrow thanks to the deal and ensure the long-term future of the football club with new investment.”
Reports emerged this week that staff hadn’t been paid, with a London group dropping out of discussions. A deal rules out any fears fans may harbour of The Iron slipping into administration and penalties that would bring to make the on-field challenges even harder. The team is already six points from safety, albeit with just over half the season remaining - with Mr Elliott revealing Saturday's match was at risk.
Speaking to Radio Humberside, Mr Elliott said that discussions had been ongoing for the past couple of months, with Mr Swann reached out following the collapse of talks with the other party. It will also see the ground return to the club, having been transferred to Mr Swann's development company in his tenure.
"He has been very honourable in terms of trying to keep football at Glanford Park with the local group," he said. "We started talking in earnest yesterday in real detail, knowing the staff needed paying, that was our key driver. We agreed a deal this morning, which is a deal to take the football club, and will also include Glanford Park; Glanford Park will be repatriated to Scunthorpe United. The agreement has been made in terms of the price we are paying for it, and by doing what we did we have secured the future of the football club, and we will obviously need to put some investment in, but it means the game on Saturday against Notts County, which was looking a little in jeopardy, will continue.
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"I just hope that we absolutely pack the park now, which is what we really hope. We need the 12th, 13th and 14th men now to help us along for the rest of the season."
On completion it will represent a full sweep of new owners of the Humber region’s professional football clubs in the past two seasons. Turkish television magnate Acun Ilicali took over Hull City from the Allams at the start of the year, with exiled entrepreneurs Jason Stockwood and Andrew Pettit uniting to take on Grimsby Town ahead of an incredible promotion season in 2021, that saw them swap places with their northern Lincolnshire neighbours ahead of the current campaign. They had bought out John Fenty, the seafood sector entrepreneur, the previous May as the Blundell Park outfit fell out of the EFL.
In a short statement released by the Glanford Park staff, the club said Mr Elliott, group commercial director of Marshall Motor Group, and Mr Sharp were heading to Scunthorpe to finalise the details and prepare for the game, home to promotion-chasing Notts County.
The Swann family, previously at the helm of retailer Wilko and with leisure interests in Blackpool, has owned the club since 2013 and they reached the League One play-offs in 2017 and 2018. Two relegations followed including a miserable 26-point season last term which saw the club end the 72-year stay in the English Football League. This term, the team has won only three league games, and suffered the indignity of crashing out of the FA Cup to South Shields, a side two leagues below, in the seventh tier of the pyramid.
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