Sheffield Wednesday takeover news: £30m price drops, Storch family waiting game, ex-chairman speaks out | OneFootball

A hefty points deduction is looming for next season, but fresh bids could be coming. Here's the latest on the Sheffield Wednesday takeover.

The Sheffield Wednesday takeover continues to rumble on.

It now seems likely that the race to buy Sheffield Wednesday will extend into 2026. Talk of announcing a preferred bidder ended up coming to nothing, and in the meantime the club remain in limbo, without a clear idea of what their future will look like.

But even though the holiday season is almost upon us, there remains a steady stream of talk about what's going to happen next, so here's a round-up of the latest news from Hillsborough as 2025 reaches its final week without a new buyer for the club having been identified.

Sheffield Wednesday price drop

One of the hot talking points of the last few weeks with regard to the sale of Sheffield Wednesday has been avoiding the 15-point deduction that would be placed upon the club were bids deemed insufficient by the EFL.

Under League rules, any club exiting administration without unsecured creditors agreeing to 25p in the pound on what they're owed, the club would be docked a further 15 points at the start of the 2026-27 season.

But fresh reporting from the Sheffield Star has indicated that this might not necessarily have to be the case. They have now reported that the club "are now likely to be available for less than the original £30m figure that was originally mooted" and that bids as low as £15-20 million could be enough to secure ownership.

They report that "there have now been suggestions from interested parties that the punishment could be discretionary, both in terms of the timing of it and whether it is implemented at all", although they go on to qualify this by adding that "no precedent of that has been found, and this publication has been unable to get any confirmation of it being the case".

They also report that some bidders could be "willing to accept the 15-points and instead invest the money saved into the club and squad if there is no way to avoid the deduction".

Sheffield Wednesday administrators waiting on fresh Storch bid; Ashley bid concerns

Writing on Patreon, journalist Alan Nixon has reported that "Sheffield Wednesday’s administrators are waiting on a new breakthrough bid from the American Storch family".

There has, in recent weeks, been considerable speculation concerning the Storch family, who were believed to have merged their interest with the American entrepreneur James McEvoy. But this merger has now demerged and with McEvoy having dropped out, and Nixon reports that there could be a fresh bid from the family.

Nixon also suggested that the administrators may have concerns over the paucity of the bid coming from Mike Ashley, who had been widely considered to be the front-runner in the race to buy the club.

"Mike Ashley is also in the race but with the lowest bid and there is no guarantee he would not go even lower if he is made preferred bidder", Nixon reported, adding that: "Also of concern to the administrators is their fee. Ashley may try to reduce their demands if he is given the chance to close a deal."

This is potentially a major issue for the administrators. Administration is an expensive process, and the insolvency practitioners dealing with it will expect to be paid in full out of the sale price of the club. If Begbies Traynor were to believe that Ashley's bid could end up low-balling them, it could affect the viability of his bid to buy the club, even if the sale price is reduced.

Sir Dave Richards speaks out on the Wednesday takeover process

Former Sheffield Wednesday chairman Sir Dave Richards has spoken out on the Sheffield Wednesday takeover, explaining why football club ownership in the 21st century is a billionaire's game rather a millionaire's game.

Writing in the Sheffield Star, Richards, who was running the club when they were last in the Premier League and who resigned in 1999 after becoming the chair of the Premier League, describes modern football club ownership as "brutal", going on to explain that the costs of running a club mean that only the mega-rich can really afford to get involved, these days:

He then goes on to explain that the costs can be far higher than most would imagine: "Any credible owner needs 30 to 40 percent of the total commitment available in cash on day one. Not property. Not shares. Cash. That means £30 to £60 million immediately accessible to absorb shocks."

Crucially, he adds that "only 5 to 10 percent" of the wealth accumulated by the seriously wealthy is liquid, explaining that, "this is why serious football owners are usually worth five to ten times what they commit. A £1 billion balance sheet provides resilience. It allows infrastructure to be funded quietly, losses to be absorbed patiently and mistakes to be corrected without panic".

The reality of the position of many billionaires is that somebody reported as being "worth" £1 billion is that they might only be able to get their hands on £50-£100 million of that wealth at any time, and that this is the sort of money required to stabilise a football club and move it forward without having to worry about the ramifications, should anything go wrong.

With the holiday period now looming, it remains to be seen if there will be significant progress towards securing a new owner for Sheffield Wednesday before the end of 2025.