Reading FC’s ‘for sale’ sign has now been up for over 500 days.
This feels like a crisis that football appears to have completely forgotten about. For the club’s supporters the torment must seem an eternity, but now the clock is ticking on this slow-motion car crash.
With the club’s detested owner Dai Yongge now banned by the English Football League, Reading are facing a crucial month in their 153-year history.
A potentially pivotal date comes on April 4, when the EFL will hold a board meeting to decide the next course of action for the League One club.
There remains hope that a successful sale will be close by that time, with American businessman Robert Platek in advanced negotiations to buy the club.
An extension could be granted a week on Friday if Reading and Platek can provide assurances that talks are moving in the right direction.
Here is the alarming part, though. If the EFL is unsatisfied with the sale process - and there have been many false dawns already - they have the power to suspend Reading from the league.
Reading will then be unable to complete the remainder of their matches, throwing the entire League One season into chaos.
‘I have so much contempt for the Dai siblings’
It is the football equivalent of slow death; an agonising, helpless situation that seems to have been ignored because of its complexities and the fact that Reading are in the third tier.
Reading is the commuter belt town with a club who were once in the Premier League and sponsored by Waitrose, right?
To the club’s suffering supporters, it has been never-ending frustration, sleepless nights and fears over extinction.
In the space of eight years, Yongge has presided over relegation, a total of 18 points deducted for various breaches of rules, transfer embargoes, player sales, the disbanding of the Women’s team and failed takeover talks.
Platek is now the fifth potential buyer to enter exclusivity and sources suggest the process is encouraging. But we have been here before.
Football needs to do more to prevent this from becoming Bury 2.0.
Adam Jones, a spokesperson from supporters’ group Sell Before We Dai, which is approaching its second anniversary, said: “The longer this saga has gone on, the more concerned fans have become about the future of the football club.
“We’ve been through multiple periods of exclusivity without a sale, and with the end of the season fast approaching, the club is on a precipice.
“I have so much contempt for the Dai siblings because of the stress they have caused fans, staff and players.
“In the longer term, we need stronger football governance to prevent the same situation unfolding at other clubs. But right now, in the short term, we need all the help we can get here at Reading.”
Yongge’s disqualification was confirmed by the EFL on Friday, yet it can be revealed that his ban was imposed on February 11.
It was not made public as Platek’s takeover was advanced and it was feared that any negative publicity could affect the deal.
Yongge was given a fortnight to appeal, and did not. He was also given 28 days to divest his shares in the club, with Reading asking for an extension which was agreed to the start of April.
His ban ended a long-running feud with the EFL, who first moved to disqualify him in September 2023.
At the time he had been charged with misconduct after failing to deposit an amount equal to 125 per cent of the club’s forecast monthly wage bill in a designated bank account.
An independent commission refused the ban, arguing that it could hinder any future sale.
Yongge has continually left the EFL exasperated ever since. The EFL remain a target for Reading fans after first allowing Yongge to pass the owners and directors test, which has since been toughened up.
A succession of failed bids and ‘moving goalposts’
Reading were relegated from the Premier League nearly 12 years ago. They were once a beacon for sensible, well-run clubs under an eccentric English owner in Sir John Madejski.
Their points total of 106 in the 2005/06 season in the Championship under Steve Coppell remains a record.
Yongge’s arrival, with his sister Dai Xiu Li, was in May 2017. Alarm bells started ringing when two of their other clubs, KSV Roeselare, in Belgium, folded in 2020 while Chinese club Beijing Chengfeng dissolved after suffering two successive relegations.
Reading were first punished with a six-point deduction by the EFL in November 2021, for exceeding losses over the permitted £39 million across three years.
Various other sanctions have followed for non-payment of wages and breaking financial rules.
A number of takeover bids have collapsed in recent years. Telegraph Sport has spoken to two groups who cite poor communication from Yongge and frequent “moving of the goalposts”.
Former Wycombe owner Rob Couhig appeared set to become the new owner last year, but protracted talks collapsed in September.
Yongge has claimed that Couhig attempted to block his sale, with an injunction launched and taken to the Commercial Court on Friday.
Yongge’s injunction failed, yet in another complicated twist, Couhig’s securities against Reading and their Bearwood training ground remain in place.
Against this backdrop of turmoil and uncertainty, Reading are in contention for a place in the League One play-offs.
Under the management of former player Noel Hunt, who replaced Ruben Selles in December, the Royals have gone ten games unbeaten.
Currently just two points behind sixth-placed Huddersfield, they have nine games left to secure a memorable end to an arduous season.
One of their standout players has been New Zealand international Tyler Bindon, who was signed by Nottingham Forest in January for around £700,000 and then loaned back.
Harvey Knibbs, the forward, has scored 14 goals in all competitions.
Reading face Peterborough this weekend and, incredibly, could lift themselves into the top six with a win and other results going their way. Hunt and his squad have shown immense mental strength.
Off the field, Reading now find themselves at situation critical.
There have been comparisons to Bury, who were expelled from the Football League in August 2019.
Sources with knowledge of both clubs insist it is a completely different situation and, up to this date, not as severe.
Yet there is no question that April 4 appears to be D-Day.
The key people involved at next month’s meeting will be the EFL’s board consisting of chairman Rick Parry and chief executive Trevor Birch, plus independent directors Caroline Artis and Justine Roberts CBE.
EFL club representatives Peter Ridsdale (Preston), Zoe Webber (Norwich), Neil Bausor (Middlesbrough), Liam Scully (Lincoln), Julian Tagg (Exeter) and Charles Grant (Crewe) will also be present at the meeting.
A successful sale is the EFL’s No. 1 objective. Platek’s takeover bid has to succeed, and Reading must be saved.
“There must be an end to this mess for the sake of the players, staff and supporters,” says Jones.
“They all deserve the opportunity to become part of a normal club again.”
