ABDALLAH Lemsagam has issued a defiant open letter to Latics fans in the face of mounting protests at Boundary Park - insisting he will not sell the club.

Saturday’s 3-0 defeat against Barrow was interrupted by supporters sitting in the centre circle midway through the second half in the latest show of defiance against the Oldham hierarchy.

However calls for Lemsagam to end his more than three years at the Oldham helm have been met with a robust response by the Moroccan football agent.

He has hit out at those boycotting games at Boundary Park and insists he has not had a “single serious offer” to take the club off his hands.

His near 3,000 word address on the club website comes after both supporters’ trust the Oldham Athletic Supporters’ Foundation, formally Trust Oldham, and independent fans’ group, Push The Boundary, expressed their frustration at the tone of a Zoom meeting with Lemsagam last week.

“I do not want to sell my ownership of the club,” the statement, in which Lemsagam passionately defended his time at Latics, read.

“I am more determined than ever to make the club successful. The actions of certain fans at the moment, the ones that want me to sell, are hurting the club.

“Encouraging non-attendance at matches, invading the pitch during matches, throwing objects at the players: those things all hurt the team and the club. If those fans want me to sell the club, why are they trying to reduce its value? 

“I have not received one single serious offer to buy the club in the past three years.

“If this section of fans continues to hurt the club and achieve their aim of depriving it of income so much so that I cannot support it, there could be terrible consequences.”

With supporters also having thrown tennis balls on to the field of play to delay the recent Carabao Cup meeting with Accrington Stanley, Lemsagam claims games could soon be forced behind closed doors at Boundary Park.

“We are very close to having to ensure the club plays behind closed doors given the pitch invasions: no doubt that is part of the plan of the fans opposed to my ownership. That will further hurt the club,” the statement continued.

“Without fans, there is no club. I understand that fans will be frustrated with where we are in the league, and they have the right to voice that frustration; but I cannot understand the abuse that is given to myself, those close to me and the staff.

“I ask all of the fans that are protesting: please don’t abuse the staff – they are trying their best. I acknowledge I am in the firing line, but they have done nothing wrong.

“I am not leaving. I am not selling. I want to work with the fans and with OASF and continue forward. I want to work with the fans and not fight with them.”

The OASF, which has a three per cent shareholding in the club and a place on the Oldham board, has seen its membership more than double in two days to 955 after sign ups opened up again on Sunday after an AGM.

After giving the club until the end of last week to reply to some concerns outlined in the 90-minute  discussion last Tuesday, OASF said in a statement issued on Friday: “The deep-rooted fear and discontentment that supporters feel were not acknowledged here or at any point in the conversation.

“It was clear from this early point that the answers we were hoping to hear, weren’t forthcoming.

“Without going into the exact back and forth of the meeting, we can say that from our perspective, Mr Lemsagam feels he is a victim, that the fans have been on his back from the start and the blame for the club’s fortunes lie elsewhere.”