YORK Wasps chairman John Stabler believes any future for York Wasps is dependent on the club finding a new income stream.

Stabler folded the Northern Ford Premiership club on Tuesday in the face of mounting debts, but the Rugby Football League have given any potential buyer until Tuesday, March 26 before accepting the Wasps' resignation from the league.

Stabler - who also quit as chairman in 1996, after which he became involved in Gateshead and then Hull FC before returning to help save the Wasps from bankruptcy via the company voluntary arrangement last year - is desperate for the club to continue.

But he says anyone taking it on needs to find improved sponsorship or another income on top of sponsorship and gate receipts.

"We first left the club in 1996 because we had the same scenario as we have now, of falling gates, no income stream and no hope of an income stream," he told the Evening Press.

"We are reliant on people coming through the turnstiles.

"We do not have huge debts but an ongoing cash-flow scenario which means we were losing money every month.

"The present debts are about £30,000 and based on current income and expenditure there will be about £71,000 more by the end of the season.

"For the club to survive there's got to be a will not only from the people of York but also from the council to allow any new owner to be able to have an income stream.

"I know the council can't go throwing money around but any new people at the club must be given an opportunity to create an income stream to keep the club running properly and not have these types of situations every few years."

He said the board at Wasps were in no position to set a deadline for new buyers before folding the club: "The York City situation was different.

"The chairman there had assets - Bootham Crescent Holdings. He was sitting on that asset and saying we've got four months.

"We haven't got any assets. The only way we could keep this going would be to put in £30,000 as directors as of last weekend and then every month until the end of October put in £10,000 more.

"And what would we have at the end of it? We would have to go through the same scenario next season for a team that finishes near the bottom.

"People have to realise there is a limit to how much we can give."

Stabler reiterated his belief that with the players promised to the club by sponsors World Rugby League (WRL), better results would have followed, with increased gates the outcome, and therefore the club would have managed to survive.

"The figure of the sponsorship deal is not that important; the main thing regarded the players we were supposed to be getting and this was the basis on which we could have gone forward on the income side."

He said the Wasps had contracted WRL to bring in these players but were unlikely to take action through the courts as WRL was an off-shore company. "The chances of being able to chase it up legally is very remote," he said.

So why sign a contract in the first place? "It's putting a shake of a hand down on paper. We were told they would follow the contract through and we had no reason to believe they would not.

"Having given us £35,000 already in sponsorship, we would ask why would they want to throw it down a black hole?"

Stabler also puts some of the blame for the club's demise on City of York Council's decision in 1995 not to give the club the lease for the ground.

Instead, the lease was taken up by Canon Leisure, with Wasps paying rent to use the ground but without having the income-generating benefit of owning their own bar or other resources.

"When the boundaries changed, the stadium changed from being in Ryedale District Council land to City of York Council. The city council had promised to help us, that they understood our position following the move from Clarence Street.

"But when it came to it, they signed up with Canon Leisure."

Stabler refuted allegations the board had strung fans along. "All the way through I've acted in good faith and have not told any lies," he said. "I've acted and said things on the back of what we'd been told."

In the meantime, Stabler has given his backing to the formation of a supporters' trust, for which a meeting has been arranged for Sunday (2pm) at Huntington Stadium.

"I wish them all the best," he said. "Hopefully they will get a boost from all the dormant fans in York, who will hopefully come out of the woodwork."

Updated: 11:30 Friday, March 22, 2002