Let's start with the basics. The four leaving are chairman Stewart Gilmour, deputy George Campbell and directors Allan Marshall and Bryan McAusland. Also selling up is Evelyn Purves, widow of ex director Jim. Together they have 98,000 shares and a 52 per cent stake in the club. Anyone buying it would get a controlling interest.
Two directors - Gordon Scott and Ken McGeoch - are not involved in the consortium. Mr Scott became a director in 2003 and was officially unveiled at the same time as Gus MacPherson was made manager. With his building background, he's overseen the stadium development and latterly the creation of the training complex. Mr McGeoch was part of the consortium that bought the club in 1998 and included the directors mentioned above.
No one knows why these two are not selling up as well. There are suggestions that the pair were only told about what was happening at 8am yesterday - just three hours before the rest of the world knew. If true, this seems a bit strange and suggests a boardroom split somewhere. Surely they should have known before then. Many people reckoned Mr Scott would take over when Mr Gilmour finally stepped down. However, if he was interested in the shares he'd probably have made an offer before things went public - unless he didn't know about what was happening. Of course, that's all conjecture - but the postings of one messageboard member seem to suggest there's more than a little truth in the rumours.
The consortium who is selling up claim they have decided to sell now as they are running out of energy and there have been a few tentative enquiries in the club in recent times. By going public, they will probably be looking to force these folk, or people like them, to make offers, or at least make their interest public too. According to Mr Gilmour there has been interest from big businesses, agencies and other clubs in buying us. The latter has been pounced on by the press today who think another club will buy us and turn us into their feeder club. While I've heard of feeder clubs, I've never heard of a club actually taking over another one (the Airdrie United/Clydebank situation aside) and this would be a rather odd state of affairs.
Any potential buyer will be getting a well run club with no debt, a place in the SPL, a brand new stadium and a nice, new training complex. The problem is we're in a recession and it might be a hard sell, resulting in the consortium still being at the club in a few years time. The board have plunged a fair amount of their own money into the club. Remember, they saved us from oblivion in 1998 when the only other option was the dodgy Reg Brealey. They underwrote two share issues that bombed, bought the club's debt from Barr Construction and funded the planning application for the new stadium. At times they used their own cheque books as if they were the club's - certain other chairman have done things the other way around. If they make a tidy sum on the sale of the club that's fine by me - they've put plenty of time and money into it after all.
What does worry me, however, is how any potential buyer will fund a purchase. One paper today suggested the asking price will be between £3million and £5million (nice and precise there). Realistically, anyone buying us won't have that amount of cash for the initial outlay, so they'll borrow it - and shift the debt onto the club. This is what has happened down south, and suddenly we'll be back in debt again with no potential get out clause. This would be a disaster.
Barring a miracle, there will be no Saudi prince coming to buy us. So who can we expect to be in the running? The chances of it being a Saints fan, or even someone from Paisley, are slim. Early rumours are that someone called Malcolm is after us, with opinion varying between the Malcolm haulage family and a chap called Stevie Malcolm, who runs a taxi empire. The latter seems to have plenty of cash - he's building a massive house at Gleneagles - but whether his intentions would be honourable is unclear.
Personally, I'd like the new man to be like the current chairman - someone who isn't going to go throwing money about recklessly, someone who will look after the club correctly - but with perhaps a bit more money behind them that could see us sign a few good players each summer.
The current board ideally want the new man, whoever he is, in place by the start of the transfer window in January, which perhaps suggests they already have someone wanting to buy the club. Whatever happens, the next few months - perhaps years - will certainly be interesting.