Notts County's administrators have secured the future of the Second Division club by accepting a takeover bid worth over £3m.
The offer, tabled by local business partners Raj Bhatia and Frank Strang, was one of three received by administrators following the approval of the Company Voluntary Arrangement by creditors on Friday.
The preferred bid has been accepted in principle by the game's authorities and administrators hope to complete the legal formalities within the next seven days. County have been in financial trouble since last June but the Meadow Lane club now look to have been saved.
Paul Finnity, partner at the Nottingham office of Kroll's Corporate Advisory and Restructuring Group and joint administrator of County, said: "I am so pleased that a deal has been finalised which effectively secures the future of the club.
"It has been a long haul, but the club is still here. That's the most important thing and is a relief for everyone involved. It would have been heartbreaking for football as a whole had the world's oldest Football League club not survived."
The bid from Bhatia and Strang was chosen over an offer from a consortium led by the current chairman, Albert Scardino, and a third proposal from Vantis Sporting Solutions.
Finnity added: "Let's not forget that the players have been magnificent and [the manager] Billy Dearden, especially, has worked miracles on the pitch when his hands were tied off it. Notts County and its fans can now look forward to next season with renewed optimism and the focus can now, rightly, return to how well the club is performing on the pitch, rather than off it."
* Mick Harford has been offered his job back as Luton Town's first-team coach following his sacking on 23 May. He has yet to accept the offer. Harford and the then-manager, Joe Kinnear, were dismissed when a mystery consortium took over the club. Luton are still without a chairman after Roger Terrell and Lee Power decided against assuming control on Monday because of protests from fans.
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