Bristol City chairman Steve Lansdown has warned he cannot afford to keep the club at Ashton Gate at a time when players may need to be sold in January. The multi-millionaire reported the club's record losses of £11.8m for the last financial year on Thursday in an off-field setback that has cast doubts over his future.

Lansdown wants to build a new £92m all-seater stadium at Ashton Vale in order to help generate revenue via a 30,000 capacity.

But he has intimated that he could walk away from City if a recommendation from a planning inspector that the 42-acre site at Ashton Vale be registered as a town green be upheld by Bristol City Council in December.

"I cannot, in my own mind, sustain a Championship football club at Ashton Gate, not given the current set-up," Lansdown told the Bristol Evening Post.

"But I can sustain a Championship football club and a Premiership football club and make it a success in a 30,000-plus all-seater stadium at Ashton Vale.

"You have to look at the income that stadium will make if we get things right. That's what business is all about. You make a judgement and you take a risk based upon that judgement."

Lansdown, though, has promised that he will not dump City in dire straits if he does sell to another owner.

He added: "I'll be disappointed if we don't get the stadium, because I've set my heart on it, but I'll not leave this football club in the lurch.

"I don't see a great future in mulling along at Ashton Gate. If the new stadium does not come along, then I will look at getting things set up properly here to hand over to someone else going forward who can achieve what I haven't.

"But I haven't failed yet, so it's a bit premature to say I'm going to leave."

City may need to sell players in the winter transfer window in order.