Premier League

Chris Kirchner Withdraws Bid, what next?

Chris Kirchner Withdraws Bid, what next?

The situation at Derby County shows no signs of a solution. The Derby County takeover saga had a new, and unfortunate twist yesterday. Chris Kirchner, who was the preferred bidder and was close to completing a deal for the club, put out a statement yesterday. In his statement, the Slync.io CEO said that he was pulling out of the deal to take over the club after he failed to meet Friday’s 5 PM deadline to prove that he was in a position to take over the club.

Derby County’s financial problems

After Derby County had been mired in financial disaster due to overspending under their previous owner Mel Morris, they flunked the FFP rules. Initially, Morris got around it by selling the club’s stadium, Pride Park, to his own company. Some clever accounting followed, and Morris kept manipulating the club’s accounts to stay in the green.

However, after failing to reach the promised land of the Premier League, Morris left the club in a financial mess. Posting record losses, Derby were forced to sell the majority of their players while banned from spending money on new players. After failing to comply with the Financial Fair Play rules, the EFL came down hard on the club.

Derby County couldn’t buy new players, but they discovered some diamonds in their youth academy- Malcolm Ebiowei was the chief among them. 

The club went into administration. Repeated point deductions followed, totalling up to 21 points. Despite the great fight shown by Wayne Rooney’s players, the club was relegated in the 2021-22 season.

Derby County takeover saga

The administrators have been looking for new owners ever since Morris left. Moreover, their job became more difficult each day as Derby was heading towards relegation. Furthermore, Mel Morris still owned Pride Park, the club’s stadium. That raised the size of the investment further.

Erik Alonso was the first major name to throw his hat in the ring. However, he failed to show financial statements that would prove his ability to run the club successfully. After a lot of uncertainty, with manager Wayne Rooney publicly urging the process to speed up, Chris Kirchner emerged as the preferred bidder at…

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