Wembley: People need to ‘get past the emotion’ over sale says Shahid Khan

Triesman, who became the FA’s first independent chairman in January 2008 but resigned in 2010, said he had “real misgivings” about the sale of the stadium, but was more concerned about the influence the FA council will have on the decision-making process.

“One thing I know from the FA is that the internal structures, the people on the board and on the council, in the final analysis they have the final say,” he explained.

“I think however skilled the FA’s specialist advisors may be, unless you have got absolutely the right team we will find that a number of people who know very little about it are taking the final decisions.

“The top executive team is very good – beyond that there isn’t much skill.

“When the first arrangements were made for the re-building of Wembley it was true that people with knowledge of the football business were involved but I wouldn’t say there were people who were real experts on real estate.

“Wembley is a piece of real estate, like it or not, and I don’t know whether that knowledge is there now.”

The Labour peer added that although he thought it was in the power of the council to veto any vote, he hoped that it would back Khan’s bid, which could see his NFL side take up permanent residency at Wembley.

“I hope they would say we may know a lot about grassroots football around the country, but we know nothing about the finances and the economics of a huge stadium which is a piece of the national legacy,” he said.

“I want to know exactly how the stadium will be used once it is in private hands because there was a great deal of public money and public interest in the re-creation of a national stadium and I’d want to know it will still be going to meet some of those objectives that people had at the time.

“Given it was public money, I can’t see why there should be no full disclosure of the negotiations which are going on.”