Chance of Club 9 talks resuming for Owls now highly unlikely – Parker

The American sports company offered just 2m for a 38 per cent stake in the League One club last week dashing hopes of a 20m investment.

Chairman Lee Strafford subsequently resigned and former manager Howard Wilkinson has been installed as interim chairman.

Although Jon Pritchett, a director of the Chicago-based company, has now set the Owls a 'deadline' of tomorrow to re-open negotiations, the deal is unlikely to be resurrected.

Parker said: "I have listened with interest to the public announcements made by Club 9 Sports over the past week. The board made very clear in our statement last Friday that the offer from Club 9 was wholly unacceptable to both us and the bank.

"Given that they have made no sensible improvement to it since, there is little prospect of taking discussions with them forward any further."

Parker also confirmed that meetings will be taking place with manager Alan Irvine this week to determine his spending budget for the coming season.

Irvine told the Yorkshire Post yesterday that he was still in the dark about the amount of money available for new players.

"There has been a lot for everybody to take on board in recent weeks and my focus, along with Howard and Alan, is to make the necessary changes on the pitch to ensure that we are a contender for immediate promotion next season," said Parker.

"I am meeting with Alan and my colleagues this week to finalise these plans and I am hoping that Alan will be pleased with what we have come up with.

"In addition, I am looking to meet with fan groups over the coming few days to make sure that they understand that their club is in good hands and that we are looking to the long-term future of the club.

"I will continue to deal with everybody involved with the club with dignity and professionalism and I would hope that everybody who wants to be involved with the club would do the same.

"We have a lot of experience in ensuring that this club is financially stable and has been for many years, due in no small part to the longer-serving directors of Sheffield Wednesday."

Officials at Club 9 Sports have stressed that their offer to the Owls board, although initially 2m, would have risen to 10m on the club securing a return to the Championship.

They had also wanted to charge the club 420,000 a year in management fees and wanted four members out of seven on the club's board.

Owls goalkeeper Lee Grant, meanwhile, says he has no intention of submitting a transfer request despite links with Burnley and West Bromwich Albion.