Bolton Wanderers have released a statement on behalf of their administrators, responding to Laurence Bassini's claims that he is back in the running to buy the club.

The English businessman was adamant that he had reached an agreement to buy Bolton earlier this year but the deal collapsed after he failed to provide proof of funding, resulting in the club being placed into administration.

Bassini claimed during an interview with TalkSPORT on Friday morning that he is back in the running to buy the club and that he has been given £25million by West Ham United co-owner David Sullivan to help him complete the takeover.

However, Bolton have since released a statement on their club website on behalf of their administrators in response to his comments, insisting that he will not be buying the club.

The statement read: "We note with dismay the interview given by Laurence Bassini to TalkSPORT this morning.

"The simple fact is, for several reasons, Mr Bassini was not the successful bidder under the process we have carried out to sell Bolton Wanderers.

"His bid was not the best for the club. Moreover, he was not able to satisfy either the proof or source of funding to the satisfaction of the process or within the proscribed timeframe. That remains the case.

"Subsequently, Mr Bassini has sent a vast number of erratic and threatening emails and text messages, as well as making threatening calls, to the point where we have instructed lawyers to deal with them.

"We will be making no further comment about Mr Bassini or his claims."

Bolton released a statement earlier this month confirming the Football Ventures consortium as their preferred bidder for the acquisition of the club and Bolton fans are hoping for the deal to be finalised within the coming days, after significant progress was made last weekend.

The Verdict

These are certainly some bold claims from Bassini, but this latest statement from Bolton suggests that he has no chance of buying the club.

If you want to buy a football club, then sending threatening text messages and emails is definitely not the right way to go about things, so it's probably a good thing for Bolton fans that Bassini will not be buying the club.

He's developed a reputation as being a controversial owner from his time in charge at Watford and was banned from football for three years for alleged financial misconduct.

Hopefully Bolton can reach an agreement with Football Ventures to finalise the takeover within the next few days and when that happens the club can finally begin to move forward after months of uncertainty.