What’s really happening behind the scenes of sale

A takeover expert has revealed what will be happening behind the scenes at Sunderland - as Stewart Donald looks to sell the club.

The majority shareholder has publicly announced his intention to sell his stake in the Black Cats, and football finance expert Kieran Maguire of the University of Liverpool has revealed what is likely happening at the Stadium of Light as the takeover process begins.

“There will be agents phoning up Stewart Donald, or brokers, all the time,” he explained. “They’ll be saying ‘I’ve got an interested party from Turkey, Hong Kong and so on.

“The first thing he’ll do is filter out the tyre-kickers from people who are serious. One way of doing that is to say you have to put down a nonrefundable deposit to look at the books in detail - that will probably scare away about 99% of people.

“They’re looking at a business that will be losing money, certainly in League One and especially with running out of parachute payments.

“But the interested parties will come in, have a look at the costs have been over the last few seasons and if there are any issues there. And then they will look at the current contracts to look at what the players costs will be, what they’re inheriting and committed to paying out.

“Depending on the wealth of the people coming in, that would also determine how much they are prepared to invest on the pitch and in turn how much they would pay Stewart Donald.”

Shortly after announcing his intention to depart, Donald told BBC Newcastle that he hoped a takeover would be concluded in a ‘month or two’.