Aston Villa FC have today moved a step closer to having new owners, after Randy Lerner granted exclusive negotiations to an unnamed bidder.
The bidding party, thought not to be involved with early favourite Paul Smith, have sole rights to bidding for ownership of the Midlands club for six weeks.
This term of agreement, called exclusivity, means that the bidding party are the sole company who can come forward with a proposal for American owner Lerner, as long as they do it within a scheduled time period.
Lerner has been looking to sell Villa for around 12 months, and originally demanded £200million for the club that he paid £55million for in 2006, however has lowered the price to around £170million due to a lack of interest.
Any new owner would give fans hope of seeing manager Tim Sherwood backed in the summer transfer window, as Villa look to improve upon last season's finish of 17th place.