Roland Wycherley opens up on Shrewsbury Town sale attempts, John Terry claim, supermarket struggles and dreading Saturdays

Wycherley, 84, is the oldest and longest-serving chairman in the Football League and has been trying to find new owners for his hometown club for a number of years.

Several sale efforts have fallen by the wayside and in an interview with the Daily Mail the former vending machine business owner revealed he has had 18 different buying parties on site showing interest in the club relegated from League One last season.

Wycherley, who has had to stump up £3.4million over the last two years to keep the club afloat, continues to look for new owners for the club he has owned since 1996 and prospective buyers met at Croud Meadow this week.

Wycherley said: "Aside from loans to me, which are at zero interest, we are debt free. It is a clean buy for someone.

"Getting to that stage has come at significant personal cost. I've lived off my earnings for 20 years. Never taken a penny out. Since Covid I’ve put £3.4m in to keep it going. If I’m guilty of anything, at times I haven’t surrounded myself with the right people."

The Town chairman, a supporter since he was a schoolboy having watched Town's reserves at Gay Meadow aged seven, has taken flack from frustrated supporters recently following relegation from the third tier, a worrying start to life in League Two and takeover attempts hitting the buffers.

Shrewsbury were in an exclusivity period at the beginning of this year but the sale fell through. Wycherley revealed he was once in receipt of a formal written offer of half the price a deal had been shook at.

The New Saints owner Mike Harris has been vocal online about making the Town chairman an offer for the club and Wycherley even detailed when an interested group wanted to appoint John Terry as head coach instead of Michael Appleton - only to approach Wycherley for the Chelsea legend's contact details.

"We’ve had 18 different bodies here," Wycherley added. "I agreed a deal with some Americans but they had legal things going on in the background and they dropped it. My grandson, who is autistic, started getting stick at school - 'your granddad needs to get out'.

"One of the problems is social media. Someone bid £5m and people see that. We’ve got 31 acres, the stadium cost £13m to build, we spent £1.5m on the training ground.

"These people come in and it’s 'wow, this is it'. For one reason or another it never happens.

"I had a man here saying he was fronting the Saudis. He walked in with two architects and an interior designer, saying they were going to spend £1m on reception and the boxes and that they’d get a shirt sponsor for a million. I’m thinking 'that’s super'.

"They were stationed at this hotel in Bridgnorth and said they were going to buy it. At the time, [former manager] Gareth Ainsworth left us. I told him I needed to bring someone in and liked [current manager] Michael Appleton. He said if I did that they’d walk away.

"I told him that when it’s your club you can do what you want but we need a manager. They said they had their own manager and it was John Terry. A week later they asked me for John Terry’s number!

"Anyway, apparently I was untrustworthy so they had a meeting with my vice-chairman. I put my picture up on the wall so I could watch them. It got to the owners' and directors' test with the EFL and they just kept saying they had billions but not where it had come from. Eventually they said they were connected to Saudi wealth, the people who bought Newcastle, and immediately the whole thing was null and void."

Frustration from Town fans has threatened to boil over more recently with audible matchday protests and more, as the chairman and grandfather of three detailed.

"The other week some fans turned up on my street asking neighbours where I lived,’ he said.

"I can’t go to Sainsbury’s any more. When I’m in my car people will wave at me and when I wave back they give me the finger and tell me to 'f*** off'."

With a banana-skin FA Cup first round tie at non-league South Shields on the horizon on Sunday, Wycherley added: "There’s what it means to the town but there’s also 400 people who work here, including the Foundation, so it’s a big responsibility. I’d like to be able to come here with the family and just enjoy it. At the moment, I dread Saturdays.

"I do worry, yes [about age]. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t. I’m 84 and it weighs on my mind. Some of the fans think I’m milking it but I’ve never had a penny. All of my success in business has supported me to here. I worry about my two kids and my grandkids, about getting time out of whatever I have left to spend with them."