Raith Rovers: Chairman Steven MacDonald reveals Scottish consortium is in running to buy club 'by end of March'

Raith Rovers chairman Steven MacDonald has revealed that talks are progressing well between club owner John Sim and a Scottish consortium interested in buying Rovers for around £3 million with the aim of ultimately taking the Stark’s Park team into the Scottish Premiership.
Raith chairman Steven MacDonald, pictured with manager Ian Murray is optimistic about sale of club to Scottish consortium (Pic Paul Devlin/SNS Group)Raith chairman Steven MacDonald, pictured with manager Ian Murray is optimistic about sale of club to Scottish consortium (Pic Paul Devlin/SNS Group)
Raith chairman Steven MacDonald, pictured with manager Ian Murray is optimistic about sale of club to Scottish consortium (Pic Paul Devlin/SNS Group)

With dialogue between Sim and financial investment company Silverbear Capital Inc now officially over, news of the consortium’s involvement will likely be welcomed by fans of the cash-strapped Kirkcaldy outfit which is looking for a buyer having made an average operating loss of £150,000 a season since 2005.

Speaking exclusively to the Fife Free Press, MacDonald said: “John Sim was speaking to the Scottish consortium directly.

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"Obviously he’s away back to Thailand and they were getting to the nitty-gritty of things.

"I believe talks are going well. Obviously these guys think that something could be done here and they are looking to take the club into the premier league.

"That’s part of their goal and I believe we could do it with the right people on board.

"I certainly like their drive and their passion for the game.

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"I like the fact that they see Raith Rovers as a progressive club. Saying that, we have a lot of work to do here.

"They see the potential to make the place, the club, the buildings better to enhance the atmosphere of fans coming to the ground.

"They’re looking at whether there’s possibilities to change the part underneath the main stand to give the players better facilities.

"They have seen all that, they have looked at all that and they’re prepared to do something.

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"All in all it seems like they have put a good package together and I'm sure Mr Sim is looking at it very favourably.

"Obviously there’s a lot of paperwork to tie all the ends up. It always gets drawn out longer than anticipated with these things. The same as sometimes buying a house could be drawn out.

"We would like to think that moving towards the end of March that everything would be concluded.”

MacDonald said that one other non-Scottish interested party – based in mainland Europe – was also still in dialogue with Sim about a potential purchase of Rovers.

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Rovers – seventh in the Championship with 29 points from 22 games – get a break from the league this weekend as they visit runaway East of Scotland premier division leaders Linlithgow Rose on Saturday in the Scottish Cup fourth round, kick-off 3pm, and MacDonald is excited by the prospect.

"It’s a huge tie for both teams,” the Stark’s Park supremo added. “Having a junior football background myself I’ve been at Linlithgow many a time. They are a very good club.

“There is a lot of good history there and they’ll be definitely looking to have a cup upset.

"But the manager has our guys very focused. The players know what to do and on paper we should be winning.

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"We’re going there with confidence that we will win the game but also giving them the utmost respect that they certainly deserve.

"It’s an exciting tie for us because if we do get through it there is the possibility of drawing one of the big guns and every player wants to play against the bigger sides.

"It’s a case of: ‘Let’s go and get the job done on Saturday’ and then we’ll take everything else as a bonus from there on.”

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