Source: TheGuardian
Bury expelled from EFL after 125 years: updates and reaction – live
All the latest after Tuesday’s takeover of club collapsesDavid Conn: series of failures that left proud Bury in ruinsDavid Squires on Bolton, Bury and threat to our football clubsEmail jacob.steinberg@theguardian.com | Tweet @JacobSteinberg 9.53am BST Awful news for @buryfcofficial and @forever_bury - this has to be the wake up call for the FA to become the independent regulator it must become. It is crystal clear clubs / leagues cannot regulate themselves. The FA has to step up & protect our historic clubs. 9.50am BST The FA have announced that Bury will not be involved in this season’s FA Cup. They would have entered the first round in November. 9.47am BST If you’re a Bury fan, what do you do without football on a Saturday? This could happen to fans of any lower league club, you know. A football club plays such a crucial role in a local community and means so much to so many people. It’s part of their lives. You never think it won’t be there. What do you do without it? 9.33am BST In other grim news Bolton Wanderers could yet go the same way as Bury. They have been given 14 days to find a buyer. Related: Bolton given 14 days to find a buyer by EFL or face expulsion 9.15am BST Related: Series of grinding failures that left proud, historic Bury in ruins Related: Bury FC: despair as club is expelled from Football League after 125 years 9.15am BST Bury captain Neil Danns delivered a strong message to owner Steve Dale yesterday.“I would say look what you’ve done. This should never have happened. If you thought you could not move this club forward in a positive way you should never have taken over because you’ve literally destroyed lives, because that’s what this football club meant to so many fans. When you see the devastation of the fans I just think I have to say something. It’s unbelievable. I still can’t believe it. We have been in as normal, training. I don’t think anyone really believed that this was going to happen. We were just preparing every single week as though the next game was going to be on, the next game was going to be on. For it to happen so suddenly, it’s still really unbelievable. For a club with so much history and that has added so much to the league, for it to just be gone like that is just unimaginable.”I’ve come to have a special bond with the fans and created some amazing memories, especially last year. At this moment in time I just feel for them the most because you have got people who have been going to the game for years. It’s like every story, you go to the game with your Grandad, your Mum, your Dad, your brothers, it’s such a community. It means so much to people. For me, it’s starting to hit me harder because I have got young sons myself. I know what it is like to take them to watch my boyhood team Liverpool and the bond that gives us. To see that taken away from future fans is just devastating. Football brings not just football on the pitch but it is so much more than that. This whole situation just does not feel real.” 9.11am BST Dave Giffard, the chair of Forever Bury Supporters Club, says that fans are discussing their next move. We have got a meeting this morning to look at our next move. What we would like to do is try and save this football club. If we have to restart as a phoenix club we would like to get hold of this ground. We have the support of the council.” 9.10am BST Hello. This is a dark day for English football. Bury have been expelled from the Football League after 125 years of membership after after the EFL board finally ran out of patience with its financial collapse and owner, Steve Dale. The deadline for the club to find a new owner passed on Tuesday afternoon, with a proposed sale to C&N Sporting Risk collapsing earlier in the day. Shame on Dale, shame on the EFL, shame on the Football Association. We’ll have rolling reaction here today as Bury supporters reel from the shock of their club’s expulsion from the league. Related: Bury expelled from EFL after 125 years as takeover collapses Continue reading......read full article
