Sale wrangle at Carson Yeung's Birmingham City

The man entrusted with selling Birmingham City, the English soccer side owned by troubled Hong Kong businessman Carson Yeung Ka-sing, has accused the leader of the Italian consortium looking to buy the club of running a media campaign so that he can "get it on the cheap".

Peter Pannu is the club's acting chairman and chief of parent company Birmingham International Holdings (BIH). In September, a reported bid of £12 million (HK$148 million) by an Italian consortium led by Gianni Paladini, the former chairman of English Premier League club Queen's Park Rangers, was rejected by Pannu and the Birmingham board.

But earlier this month Pannu received a second, improved bid from the Italians of £30 million to take over the the club that plays in the Championship, England's second tier. Paladini told the British media that the sale was a done deal. But this is far from the truth.

"I support freedom of speech and he [Paladini] can say what he likes in the press, but if anyone wants to buy our club they better prove they've got the money to do it before they talk to the British media," Pannu said. "There's been a complete misrepresentation that he's closing in on a purchase and it's totally without foundation."

The Italian told the British press last week that he wanted to get a deal done very soon because he didn't want the club to lose any players in the January transfer window. "I am hopeful that we can get something agreed within the next 10 days. We are keen to get it all sorted by the end of next week," Paladini said.

Pannu, a lawyer and former Hong Kong policeman, has been on the lookout for a new investor to buy the club, but said he'd had enough of Paladini's "antics".