Crystal Palace Football Club Go Into Administration - 26th January 2010. Which Club Will Be Next?

OFFICIAL CLUB STATEMENT:

Following a 5pm meeting at the club the following statement was released.

Brendan Guilfoyle, Chris White and John Russell of the P & A Partnership have today been appointed administrators of Crystal Palace Football Club.

The administrators have been appointed to rescue the club and reconstruct its finances and will be urgently seeking buyers.

Brendan Guilfoyle said: "This club has been in the spotlight for some months with creditors pressing for payments and players anxious about their wages.

"Our role now is to find a buyer quickly to provide certainty for the employees, players and fans for the future. We are hoping our appointment will be short-lived as we understand there are many interested buyers."

"Our role now is to find a buyer quickly to provide certainty for the employees, players and fans for the future. We are hoping our appointment will be short-lived as we understand there are many interested buyers," he added in the statement.

Palace are ninth in the table, having been on the fringes of the promotion playoff places most of the season as they attempt to return to the Premier League for the first time since 2005.

However, administration leads to an automatic 10-point penalty which would leave them battling to avoid relegation.

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SKY SPORTS NEWS:

Crystal Palace have gone into administration and are facing an immediate 10-point deduction as a result.

The Football League is still to confirm the penalty as they are awaiting legal paperwork, but administrators have been appointed in a bid to rescue the Championship club.

The Selhurst Park outfit have been struggling financially for some time with chairman Simon Jordan actively seeking new investment.

Palace's players have seen their wages delayed this season, while the club have been forced to operate under a transfer embargo due to their plight.

The South London side have now been left with no option but to place the club into administration in the face of mounting debts.

Their 10-point deduction will see them plunge from ninth in the table and on the fringes of the play-off race to 20th, just four points above the drop zone.

Rescue.

A statement released to Sky Sports News read: "Brendan Guilfoyle, Chris White and John Russell of the P & A Partnership have today been appointed administrators of Crystal Palace Football Club.

"The administrators have been appointed to rescue the club and reconstruct its finances and will be urgently seeking buyers."

The administrators remain confident that they will soon be able to find a new buyer to save the ailing Eagles.

Guilfoyle said: "This club has been in the spotlight for some months with creditors pressing for payments and players anxious about their wages.

"Our role now is to find a buyer quickly to provide certainty for the employees, players and fans for the future.

"We are hoping our appointment will be short-lived as we understand there are many interested buyers."

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THIS IS CROYDON TODAY.CO.UK - FROM A PALACE PLAYER'S PERSPECTIVE - MATT LAWRENCE

Palace defender Matt Lawrence says the Eagles playing staff will be "bitterly disappointed" at the news that the club have been placed into administration.

Most of the club's players and coaching staff were in the air on a flight to Newcastle for tomorrow night's clash with the Championship league leaders as the news broke.

Lawrence, who had got the train up to the North East, was waiting for his team mates at the hotel as he spoke with the Advertiser.

"I think they are on the way here now so I'm sure most will have heard the news, I'm sure the texts will have been flying around," he said. "I would imagine that some of the staff and possibly Shaun [Derry - Palace's captain] may have been told before they got on the flight, but I don't know for sure.

"It's just bitterly disappointing that all the hard work done by the players and the manager so far this season to get us where we are in the league has disappeared.

"We were two points off the play-offs but now we are just four points above the relegation zone. So obviously the focus has changed."

Lawrence, who was been a peripheral figure at Palace for the majority of the campaign, insists the team will simply have to roll up their sleeves and get on with their job - just as they have done all season.

"We're in a relegation scrap now and rather than tomorrow night's game being a six pointer in terms of the play-offs, the games with Peterborough and Scunthorpe in the next two weeks are the six-pointers.

"I think the lads have shown that during these hard times they have been focussed on the football and I'm sure they will keep on doing the same thing now. The games we have got remaining have just taken on even more significance."

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BBC SPORT:

Championship side Crystal Palace have gone into administration, according to administrators P&A Partnership.
The Eagles twice failed to pay players this season and chairman Simon Jordan had been searching for new investors.

Clubs entering administration are automatically docked 10 points, which would see Palace drop from ninth place to two spots above the drop zone.
But the Football League has yet to receive formal confirmation from either the club or the administrators.

The Football League would need to see official documentation before applying the penalty.
"Our role is to find a buyer quickly to provide certainty for the future," said administrator Brendan Guilfoyle.

"This club has been in the spotlight with creditors pressing for payments and players anxious about wages.
"We are hoping our appointment will be short-lived as we understand there are many interested buyers."
Palace have reported debts of approximately £30m and are due in court on Wednesday to face a winding-up order from HM Revenue and Customs.

Despite their financial constraints - Warnock has at times not been able to name seven substitutes this season - Palace were lying two points off the play-offs ahead of Wednesday's trip to Newcastle.

Warnock will instead have a relegation fight on his hands, while the sale of his star players, such as teenage striker Victor Moses, now seems inevitable.
Jordan, who saved Palace from administration in 2000, last year announced his intention to sell the club.

The club has twice since been subject to a transfer embargo, with the Palace players first informed that Jordan had "cashflow" problems at the end of November.