OK, so Ryder is STILL waiting for Football League approval
Friday’s club statement by Port Vale FC is unfortunately not confirmation that Keith Ryder has received Football League approval for his bid and the wait goes on…
It now appears that the brief club statement on the official website – “In accordance with Football League Regulation 94.1 – Publication of ownership Port Vale F.C. Ltd is owned 100% by Mr. Keith Ryder” is simply a legal requirement (following the administrators’ statement last week that a contract had been signed making Keith Ryder the new owner of Port Vale FC).
So, while Keith Ryder’s ownership of Port Vale FC has been confirmed (and publically announced via the club statement) the club and Ryder are still awaiting confirmation from the Football League that they approve of his takeover bid.
In effect, while Ryder owns the club, in order to play football in League Two next season, he still needs approval from the Football League.
We apologise for any confusion our earlier news story (“Ryder (finally) completes Port Vale takeover”) gave (we’re in good company as the BBC and Sporting Life have also published similar stories) but to be fair, it may have been better for the club to explain the situation in the statement, rather than simply publishing the two sentence statement that has caused so much confusion amongst fans.
For instance, it would not have taken much for the club to add the lines “We are still awaiting Football League approval of Mr Ryder’s bid, this statement is merely to publically acknowledge last week’s agreement that the administrators have sold the club to Mr Ryder.”
Let’s hope the actual confirmation of Football League approval is not too long in the future…