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Last chance of survival for Boro
CREDITORS have warned they are close to liquidating Scarborough Football Club.
The stark message was spelt out at a meeting of Scarborough Council's influential cabinet where members were discussing part of a rescue package for the club.
Graham Price, the council's head of property services, said the warning about the future of the club was contained in a letter from insolvency practitioner Begbies Traynor, which is trying to sort out Boro's debts, believed be around 2 million.
The letter to the council says HM Revenue and Customs had said it would liquidate the company which runs Boro if the discussions with the council were not favourable.
Mr Price said: "We have been working for a long time to try to find a way out for the club. This could be the last chance of survival."
The deal being hammered out with the club could involve the council taking over the freehold of Boro's new ground, which would then be leased to a community trust.
The club wants to sell the McCain Stadium in Seamer Road for housing and move to a new ground in the Eastfield area.
However, there is a covenant on the Seamer Road site which says the land can only be used for sport.
Yesterday the cabinet was recommended by officers to agree "in principle" to its lifting. But members felt they needed more information and deferred a decision for another month.
Stuart Canvin, chairman of the Boro Supporters' Club, said he was shell-shocked at yesterday's news and plans to get up a petition lobbying the council to back Boro's move to a new ground.
He said: "A lot of people think that it would be best if the club folds and starts afresh, but what they don't realise is that if that happens then Scarborough would not be able to play at the Seamer Road ground. We would have to start again in the local leagues and that would not be viable at the McCain Stadium, so we would lose the ground.
"In any case the creditors would take the first opportunity to seize the ground – they would see it as Boro's only real asset.
"A new ground would be a tremendous facility for the town's sporting community. It must happen otherwise a club that was founded in 1879 and is one of the oldest in the country might well die."
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Weather for Scarborough
Saturday 26 May 2012
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Temperature: 10 C to 18 C
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Temperature: 9 C to 16 C
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