Bolton Wanderers: Where next as financially troubled club face liquidation?
"It's heartbreaking. It cannot happen to the club and town. It's a devastating prospect."
Bolton Wanderers face one of the most crucial weeks in the club's 145-year history after they were left on the brink of liquidation on Monday.A takeover of the club by Football Ventures collapsed at the weekend, plunging their immediate future into doubt.
But how did one of the founder members of the Football League, who reached the last 16 of the Uefa Cup only 11 years ago, reach this point and where do they go now?
Monday's administrators' statement said that the deal to sell the club collapsed after all parties involved agreed terms to complete the sale, other than former owner Ken Anderson.
The news left those at the club stunned, with the administrators suggesting 150 jobs could be lost if they went under.
"We are very worried at the prospect of the club being liquidated and we urge all parties involved to work together to get a deal to save us sorted," an unnamed staff source told the BBC.
"We are a founder member of the Football League and have a long and proud history in English football," the club source continued.
"For Bolton Wanderers to no longer exist is unthinkable."
Much of the summer has been a stalemate as the protracted takeover showed no sign of getting over the line, leaving the club's fan base hoping a last-minute deal could be done to get the takeover back on track.
"Please, please save this club. You've got so much on the line here. You've got several generations and the whole Bolton community just pleading for you to get this deal done," Will Jones, of fan blog Lion of Vienna Suite, told BBC Radio Manchester.
"You've got the elderly generation who've been watching for 70-80 years and it might be the last thing they have left.
"For the parents who have got to tell their youngsters that they are not able to go and watch their club on a Saturday any more, that's just devastating in itself.
"It's absolutely devastating and all I'd say is please do it for the community and the club because it does not deserve this."
Club legend and former striker John McGinlay, who scored 118 times in five years with Wanderers, says "there's a fear and a worry when it gets to this stage".
McGinlay was the last man to score at Bolton's old ground Burnden Park before their move to the Reebok Stadium in 1997 and finished as top scorer as Bolton bounced straight back to the Premier League.
"It's time to either put your money on the table or walk away because we've been through this for long enough," McGinlay told BBC Radio Manchester.
"We've been told the deal is imminent or just about to be signed for so long and it's really frustrating now.
"All of us supporters are now worried and it's coming to the end of the line now. The statements in the past couple of days from the administrators and EFL have really brought things to a head."
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