Derby County's Near Sale and Ambitious Plans for Premier League Return
Derby County owner David Clowes came within an hour of selling the club this summer – but is now doubling down on his bid to drive the Rams back to the Premier League.
That is the picture painted by chief executive Stephen Pearce, who revealed just how close Derby were to changing hands and how abruptly the deal collapsed.
A sale that vanished in an hour
Clowes, the Derbyshire property developer and lifelong supporter who rescued Derby from administration in 2022, had agreed to sell the Championship club to Saudi government official Turki Al-Sheikh in August.
The proposed takeover had cleared the key hurdles. Both the Independent Football Regulator (IFR) and the English Football League (EFL) had sanctioned the deal. Derby were braced for a new era.
Then it vanished.
Al-Sheikh suddenly withdrew, with Pearce describing the collapse as “completely out of the blue” after weeks of scrutiny and waiting.
“The wind was taken out of our sails, totally,” Pearce told BBC Radio Derby. “We weren't expecting it to fall down, effectively, an hour before we thought it was going to complete.”
For much of the summer window, Derby operated in what Pearce called a “holding pattern”, stuck between an outgoing owner and an incoming one who never arrived.
Clowes spends big while expecting to walk away
What makes the story more striking is what Clowes did while he believed he was on the verge of selling.
He kept spending.
The owner had already signed off a substantial budget and committed to major deals during the takeover process. The £6m fee to bring Bobby Clark in permanently from RB Salzburg, the £2.7m loan-to-buy agreement for Sam Szmodics from Ipswich, and around £600,000 to land Alex Mowatt from West Bromwich Albion were all funded by Clowes at a time when he thought his tenure was about to end.
“This is why he's such an incredible owner,” Pearce said. “He thought the takeover was going to happen, he knew he was never going to get a penny back for all of that money he spent on those players and he still did it.”
Clowes could have slammed on the brakes. Pearce laid out the alternative scenario bluntly.
“He could have quite easily, on 1 July, said to us and said to John [head coach John Eustace], ‘look, I think this is going through, the signs are the club is going to be sold, you're just going to have to wait because every penny I put into transfers now I'm not going to get back’.
“And he didn't. He backed it regardless and that's why we're in such a strong position.”
From open shop window to off the market
Clowes has never hidden his desire to bring in extra investment to fuel Derby’s climb back to the top flight. The agreement with Al-Sheikh – a powerful figure in Saudi government circles and a major player in boxing – looked like the injection of wealth and profile to accelerate that push after Derby narrowly missed the play-offs last season.
When Al-Sheikh walked away, the strategy flipped.
Clowes removed Derby County from the market and turned his attention inward, strengthening the squad he had almost handed over.
The biggest single outlay after the aborted deal was around £4m to prise David Ozoh from Crystal Palace. That move sat alongside a string of free transfers and loans, including a deadline-day reunion with Eiran Cashin, as Clowes underlined his commitment with more cheques rather than retreat.
Promotion drive undimmed
So has the chaotic summer knocked Derby off course in their hunt for the Premier League?
Pearce was unequivocal.
“Not in the slightest, otherwise we wouldn't have spent all the money we've spent,” he said. “We want to push on. We want progression this season.”
The takeover that never was has left Derby with the same owner, a heavier wage bill and a squad built to attack the top end of the Championship.
Now the question is simple: with Clowes still bankrolling the dream, can the Rams finally turn that ambition into a promotion charge?
