COMMERCIAL law firm Denison Till is celebrating a major role in reviving the fortunes of troubled Bradford City Football Club.

The York company's legal team represented new chairman Gordon Gibb in tense negotiations at the weekend, as a £4.6m takeover deal was agreed.

Under the terms of the agreement, ownership of Bradford City Holdings and Bradford City AFC will transfer to Mr Gibb, who is the owner of Flamingo Land theme park, in North Yorkshire, and chief executive Julian Rhodes, who was a director under former chairman Geoffrey Richmond.

The new owners each now hold 49.2 per cent of shares, with the remainder being divided between various small shareholders.

The Football League ruled last Tuesday that it would not allow Bradford City to play this season unless the transfer was completed by late Friday afternoon.

The league's conditions included Mr Gibb entering a binding agreement over his involvement with the club and that agreement should be reached with the Professional Footballers' Association (PFA) about paying arrears in players' wages.

Mr Gibb said yesterday: "It was extremely complex, with three sets of negotiations having to be conducted in tandem, against an horrific deadline in which we had to ensure that Bradford City Football Club met all its obligations to the Football League and the PFA.

"The tight deadline left very little time for us to consider all the obligations of the shareholding and commit Bradford City Football Club to a new future, but we made it."

Earlier this year, Denison Till had acted for York City Football Club owners, Bootham Crescent Holdings, in the transfer of the club to York City Racing team driver, owner and entrepreneur, John Batchelor.

Partner in the corporate department, Tony Ridge, said: "Negotiations over the transfer of the shareholding of Bradford City Football Club were extremely difficult, tense and highly complex from a legal perspective because of all the different parties involved.

"But we were delighted to be invited to act for Gordon Gibb and were pleased that, despite the very tough deadline, the deal was completed in time for the club to play its first league match at the weekend."