Former Port Vale owner Norman Smurthwaite believes it is too late to save Bury because the crisis-hit club's owner Steve Dale wants at least £1million to walk away.
Dale, a Cheshire-based businessman, bought Bury for £1 in December after previous owner Stewart Day ran up huge debts following years of overspending at Gigg Lane.
But having initially claimed to buy the club for "philanthropic" reasons, Dale put Bury into administration this summer and engineered a debt repayment scheme, known as a company voluntary arrangement, that would see creditors paid only 25 per cent of what they are owed, with him and his associates being the main beneficiaries.
"My mum's devastated. She resigned on Friday because she couldn't work with the current ownership.
"Today common sense has to prevail. One man cannot stop one football club that has hundreds of years of history going out of existence.
"I pray that common sense today prevails and that somebody is allowed to buy that club and the town has something to be proud of again."
Manchester United boss Ole Gunnar Solskjaer has offered his support to Bury, and their beleaguered neighbours Bolton.
The Norwegian said: "The Bolton situation, the Bury situation – it's hard to keep up with the top if you don't have the resources.
"Of course, as a local club we want to see our local players do well. We've recruited players from those clubs and of course we want them to do well. If there's anything we can help them with I'm sure we can do that with loan players or anything."
