MORE players will be shown the door to keep Bury FC from returning to the financial mire which came within a whisker of closing the club down.

But for the last-minute intervention of a mystery benefactor, who stumped up £500,000 to pay off Shakers' crippling mortgage debt, the 117-year-old outfit would have been closed down for good yesterday.

Instead they are now in the hands of the Save Our Shakers Appeal Trust, with the rosy prospect of a takeover by multi-millionaire rugby union chief Brian Kennedy this summer. But the Sale Sharks owner remains some distance off making a formal buy-out bid and SOS will need to budget without him to avoid another false dawn.

Manager Andy Preece has already been forced to part with nine of his first team squad to keep Bury afloat but Trust chairman Neville Neville said more would have to make way to keep the club running as a business.

"We need to be prudent," he said.

"We have had to prove to the Football League and to our creditors that we could take this club forward based on realistic cashflow forecasts.

"It's going to be hard for the first 12 months because there's still a lot of debt around but hopefully that will ease off.

"We have already had to cut our squad of players and, if I'm honest, we will have to cut it again. We have a contractual situation with the playing staff here and we will have to honour that. We don't want a Bradford situation where we are sacking players but we may have to let others go.

"So there is a down side to this and now it will require a lot of work from the supporters' trust, sponsors and investors to get us through the next 12 months."

Neville also re-iterated his desire to attract Kennedy's Zurich Premiership club to Gigg Lane.

"I believe we have an ideal situation to accommodate a rugby team here. We have done it for the past 10 years with Swinton Lions," he said.

"Brian's looking at a couple of other options - either to build his own stadium or to buy Maine Road - but I hope we can forge a relationship with him."