THE cousin and business partner of George Reynolds admitted last night that it was a mistake to take out a loan to finish Darlington FC's £20m stadium.

Richie Tennick invested his life savings in the ill-fated venture.

Now he stands to lose almost everything after the Quakers' stadium was sold to financiers The Sterling Consortium.

Sterling provided a loan of almost £4m to Mr Reynolds as the project neared completion last year.

In March, the company bought the stadium for £2.5m from administrators Wilson Field. And later this month it hopes to complete a buy-out of the club in a deal worth £700,000.

Mr Tennick, who remains a director at the club, said: "All we ever wanted to do was to create an arena to be proud of for Darlington and we were convinced, given the backing of the town, nothing would stop its success.

"Like my father, who was a shareholder at Sunderland, I have loved football all my life and it was our dream to rebuild the team after establishing the stadium as a thriving business."

Taking up Sterling's offer of a £4m loan was, he now believes, their worst error of judgement. He said he was bewildered at how the Sterling Consortium had come up with a £2.5m valuation of the stadium.

"If that's its true value then why on earth did these financiers lend us almost £4m?" he asked.

The day the Sterling Consortium bought the stadium Mr Reynolds was negotiating his own rescue package.

"It was shattering to see everything we had worked so hard for disappear in a day," he said.

Mr Tennick is convinced that both he and Mr Reynolds will not receive a penny and that the former chairman will lose his magnificent Witton Hall home.

Both Mr Tennick and Mr Reynolds have rejected the deal drawn up by the Consortium which will be put to creditors later this month.