Chris Kirchner paid the wages at Derby County last month and could be set for a hefty loss of funds if he fails to complete his takeover of the Rams, as per The Sun's Alan Nixon via Patreon.

It was something of a mystery, who had paid the wages at Pride Park for May, as the club's off-pitch problems persist.

A late payment of the wages in May would have led to a three-point penalty for the Rams, heading into 2022/23 in League One and therefore, without the takeover completed, Kirchner demonstrated a great deal of ambition to cover the wage costs, effectively from outside of the club.

Nixon reports that Kirchner is set to lose £1.6 million, should he not succeed in purchasing the club, with the money he has put in already being non-refundable.

There are still a handful of interested parties circling around Derby at the moment, suggesting that a solution will be found to the financial crisis at the club at some stage.

However, it seems highly likely that the delays of a takeover will impact on the club's squad building for the new season, which could see them scrapping towards the bottom end of the third tier in the short term.

The Verdict

A reassuring recent example to look to for Derby supporters would be the case of Wigan Athletic.

With very few senior players available and a less than ideal summer transfer window, the Latics battled for their lives at the bottom end of League One for almost the entirety of the 2020/21 campaign, and heroically stayed up by one point.

The spirit is definitely in place at Derby to replicate that achievement if not improve on it, and with Wigan strengthening enormously to take the League One title in 2021/22, there is hope that this will be a brief spell in League One for the Rams.

Time will tell, but existential concerns will sadly be growing amongst the Derby supporter base the longer this uncertainty goes on.