BetVictor Southern League Aylesbury United have given up on their dream of returning to their old Buckingham Road home after they were outbid by a Bedfordshire developer.
The Ducks haven’t played football in the town since 2006 when they were evicted from the site, pictured, after their lease expired.
It left the Southern League Division One Central‘s Ducks to groundshare with Chesham United, Leighton Town and Thame United before they headed back to Chesham’s Meadow ground home in 2017 where they still play today.
The Ducks have always harboured hopes of a return to Buckingham Road and launched their bid once the land that accommodated the stadium was put up for auction.
But those hopes were extinguished this week as the site was eventually sold on to developers, who purchased the land for £800,000 – £150,000 more than the club had offered.
The club, however, say they had no regrets at the decision not to bid more, insisting it would have put the club’s long-term future in doubt.
A statement read: “We do not intent to go into any further detail at this stage, apart from saying we bid what we could afford. We were not prepared to put the future of the club in jeopardy by committing to something (bridging loan) that we would struggle to service in the next 12 months.”
See The Non-League Paper on Sunday for the full story and the latest news from the National League down.
