Administrators finalise deal at Portsmouth FC

PKF ADMINISTRATORS have managed to save insolvent Championship side Portsmouth FC.

The club entered administration for the second time in two years on 17 February, with PKF partners Trevor Birch (pictured), Ian Gould and Bryan Jackson appointed.

Administrators have announced that player Liam Lawrence will leave the club when the paperwork is finalised today, which means they can now push ahead with a Company Voluntary Arrangement (CVA).

A CVA is an agreement between an insolvent business and its creditors to repay a percentage of its debt over a period of time. The agreement takes the business out of insolvency.

“This means that we have now successfully completed agreements with all of the first team squad and met the major condition of the offer from Portpin, which formed the basis for the CVA proposal,” said Birch.

“We will now aim to finalise our discussions with Portpin with a view to completing the sale of the club as soon as possible. The intention is to push this through early next week in order to ensure that player recruitment can begin as quickly as possible for the start of the new season.”

As part of the rescue deal a CVA, organised by the administrators, will provide unsecured creditors such as the taxman and local businesses about 2p for every pound owed.

In order for the CVA to go through, 75% or more of creditors by value of debt need to vote in favour of the proposals.

Last week player Tal Ben Haim and the administrators were still locked in a battle over wages. However, the administrators managed to secure a deal with Ben Haim who announced he would leave the club.