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NEWCASTLE UNITED FANS ANT AND DEC URGED AMANDA STAVELEY NOT TO GIVE UP AND THE FORMER MAGPIES OWNER HAS PAID TRIBUTE TO THE GEORDIE DUO 10:00, 01 Jun 2025 Amanda Staveley has admitted that

the consortium were 'about to give up' until some encouraging words from Ant and Dec helped rescue the Newcastle United takeover. Staveley, the PIF and Jamie Reuben withdrew their

offer to buy the club in July, 2020 because of the 'prolonged process under the current circumstances coupled with the global uncertainty'. The Premier League's owners'

and directors' test had been ongoing for several months at the time as the top-flight grappled with a number of issues, including the PIF's relationship with the Saudi state and

the country's links to piracy. However, ChronicleLive reported that the PIF were 'keen' to revisit the bid if the Premier League gave the deal the green light and a

breakthrough was eventually reached in October, 2021. Now, for the first time, Staveley has detailed how Ant and Dec played their part in the £305m buy-out. "I remembered the day they

came to my house, when we were trying to buy the club, and we were very nearly walking away," she told North East Times magazine. Article continues below "We were about to give up.

It had been dragging on for years and I thought we were never going to get a deal. "When they were leaving the house, they just said, ‘Keep going, you will get there'. "And

Wembley was the time to thank them. I remember saying to Dec, ‘If you hadn’t said don’t give up!, I don’t know if we would have got there'." Staveley, Mehrdad Ghodoussi and son

Alexander were in the box next to the Geordie duo as Newcastle ended a 70-year wait to win a major trophy following a 2-1 win against Liverpool at Wembley back in March. _Here at

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