DUNDALK owner John Temple has warned that the Lilywhites are still on ‘life support’ despite his 11th-hour acquisition of the club.
They staved off the threat of liquidation on Tuesday when previous owner Brian Ainscough passed the reins of the cash-strapped club to Temple.
Temple gave an exclusive interview to Dundalk’s official YouTube channel[/caption]
The barrister, who is from the Louth town, agreed to ‘underwrite the players’ current wages until the end of the season’ with a group of investors.
But he stressed: “We are far from out of the woods and the club is in serious financial difficulty.
“Undertaking the players’ wages is just one aspect.
“The creditors are banging down the door every hour and emails are coming in every second hour from people who want to appoint receivers and run to the courts and everything else. They are threatening all sorts.
“If I can keep it out of the Small Company Administrative Rescue Process (SCARP) and creditors can sit down and have a discussion with me and the other investors… the issues off the field don’t affect what’s going on on the field.
“I told the players that if I put the club into SCARP, they would have nothing to fight for.
“They have a number of big games, with Sligo to come on the weekend.
“Next week we have our first home game of my reign, which they didn’t think was going to happen, against Bohemians.
“It’s going to be a cracker of a match one way or the other.
“It’s going to bring the fans again to a club that they didn’t think they were going to have.
“It needs patience from everybody but it is also going to need support from everybody immediately.”
Temple’s emergence as new owner ensured that the club could finish the season, although questions linger surrounding the future.
Earlier this week, their accounts revealed Dundalk lost €1.2million last year alone.
Asked why he stepped in to save his hometown club for now, Temple replied: “Dundalk FC brings its own business to the town and it brings travelling fans to the club.
“That in itself creates an economy and it creates employment.
“There’s an awful lot that Dundalk has to give.
“They’ve had huge achievements over the last ten years and there are a lot of people in the town who rely on it, aspire to it and want to be part of it.
“If we were to say that that’s gone, that would be hugely unfortunate.
“It’s bleak. I didn’t put us in this situation. The fans didn’t put us in this situation and the players certainly didn’t put us in this situation. The reality is we are where we are.
“We’re on life support and we need everyone to dig deep and get in behind the club.
“We have tough decisions to make, we have tough times ahead. Some of the decisions are not going to be to everyone’s liking.
“That’s just the reality of what we have coming in.”
