Takeover Deal About To Collapse?

A report in the Express & Star by Martin Swain claims the proposed £65million takeover of Aston Villa is about to collapse. According to the report, Luke and Brian Comer aren’t happy with the profit potential and the paper quotes a source close to the multi millionaire brothers’ as saying ‘The figures just do not stack up’.

The Comer brothers haven’t publicly commented since the interest was first announced to the City by Aston Villa plc before this years AGM. However reports have suggested that their main area of interest was the potential for property deals. Villa hold a couple of significant plots of land within Aston and the surrounding areas. However, having looked more closely, the suggestion is they don’t believe the potential is good enough for what they had in mind. This could be worryingly accurate because neither Luke or Brian are thought to be fans of football.

Martin Swain reports that they were interested in what they thought would be land deals in the region of £100million but ‘that is just not the case. There are two extra pieces of land worth between £15m-£20m, but not enough to warrant spending £65m buying the club.’

Aston Villa have stated that talks are ‘on-going’ and Mike Neville, who is Comer Homes chief operating executive also says the deal is still on.

Several reports today have also focused on the broker who is said to have brought this deal to the table. Paul Garland is awaiting sentencing on 11 counts of deception to which he has pleaded guilty.

So, unless these reports are wide of the mark, back to square one by the looks of it! Lets face it, there needs to be a resolution one way or the other, at the moment the club is in limbo, and that isn’t healthy for the plc or playing side of things.

What are the odds of a report about the next bid come Sunday?! Shame we can’t divert Bob Kraft’s attentions from a rumoured £100million takeover at Liverpool.