Yeung takeover terminated

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The Blues made the announcement to the Stock Exchange on Thursday morning, ending months of uncertainty over whether the Hong Kong businessman and his associates would complete a buy-out of the club having bought a 29.9% stake in July.

The prospects of the deal being completed have faded in recent weeks and today's statement from Birmingham City plc read: "The company announces it has terminated discussions with Grandtop International Holdings ('GIH') as the directors are no longer confident GIH will be able to make a general offer for the company.

"The directors confirm they are not in discussions with any other potential offerors for the company."

Birmingham co-owners David Sullivan and David Gold had recently expressed grave doubts that the takeover would be completed, with Gold at one stage describing the deal as "dead in the water" - and Thursday's announcement comes close to the deadline set by the board for Yeung to seal the buy-out.

The protracted takeover bid has been blamed for the departure of manager Steve Bruce to Wigan. The former Manchester United defender was unhappy that Yeung's consortium would not discuss a new contract with him.

Sullivan and Gold are now set to run the club as before and have ruled out the prospect of the club being taken over until next summer at the earliest, with Gold downplaying reported interest from Russian billionaire Vagit Alekperov.

Earlier this week, Gold said: "We now need a period of stability. That is 100% correct. We will do nothing now. We can't stop people making inquiries. We will concentrate 100% from now until the end of the season on Birmingham staying in the Premier League.

"We won't entertain anything until the summer. Our fans have been to hell and back and so have the staff. The board has also gone through a difficult time over this. Now is the time to focus on staying in the Premier League everyone worked so hard to get back into last season."