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Kiwi still interested in buying Portsmouth

Peter Storrie could not prevent Portsmouth from slipping into administration © Getty Images

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New Zealand businessman Victor Cattermole is still interested in buying Portsmouth, despite the Premier League's bottom club going into administration and facing a nine-point deduction.

Pompey, who faced a winding-up petition issued by Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs over a multi-million pound tax bill, went into administration on Friday to avoid going out of business.

As a consequence, Portsmouth are almost certain to be deducted nine points by the Premier League, which will leave the club 15 points off safety, with only 11 games to play.

But the club's dire circumstances have not scared off Cattermole and his Endeavor Plan consortium, who were also interested in a takeover deal prior to the club going into administration.

"We are still interested in buying Portsmouth," Cattermole told Sky Sports: "We still have to carry out due diligence and see what is owed, what is expected to be paid for it and what the value's going to be once the whole issue of relegation and the nine-point issue is sorted out.''

The reason given for the lack of a sale last week was that none of the parties in talks had provided the club's chief executive Peter Storrie and current owner Balram Chainrai with proof that funds were in place.

That ruled out the prospect of a deal being completed before the winding-up hearing, but Cattermole said: "We provided evidence of an offer for a bank facility of €200 million last Tuesday to Peter Storrie. That was obviously not disclosed to any of the media.

"We also wrote to them advising that we were strongly opposed to administration but they had a path they were on and it didn't matter what we said, that wasn't going to change."

© ESPN Sports Media Ltd.