A mystery Shropshire businessman was considering bailing out the West Mid Show to the tune of £50,000 before advisors warned him not to, it was claimed today.

Keith Winter, treasurer of the Shropshire and West Midlands Agricultural Society, said that the man had been looking into the possibility of giving the cash as a donation to help safeguard the 120-year-old event in Shrewsbury for future generations.

But after receiving professional advice, he told officials he could not make the generous offer.

Mr Winter said it came as a huge blow to the society which had already received pledges of more than £9,000 from other business figures and companies following the creation of a special business board task-force set up to try and prevent the show from financial ruin.

He said: “One person was going to put in £50,000 and that money, on top of the pledges, would have been sufficient with the deal with the creditors to defer payments to keep us going.

“But unfortunately the money was not forthcoming.

“The person concerned took professional advice, perhaps from a solicitor, who advised him not to.

“He looked very seriously at committing it, but in the end it was not to be.

“When he said the money was not going to be coming, then we got the insolvency practitioner in because we had exhausted all options.”

Mr Winter said that if the money had been put down he believed that the number of pledges to help the society would have continued to grow.

He also said a number of trustees were willing to make donations to keep the show going.

Mr Winter said: “In the end the amount of pledges probably totalled more than £9,000, but once the £50,000 fell through and with the VAT situation it could not go ahead.”

Earlier this week it was revealed a deal to save the West Mid Show from financial ruin came within moments of being struck until a VAT bill was uncovered which scuppered any rescue plan.

Organisers of the West Mid Show were also proposing to change the event’s name just weeks before it went into liquidation in a bid to give it a stronger county identity.

The Shropshire & West Midlands Agricultural Society Council discussed changing the name of the show to the Shropshire Show when it met in October.