FORMER Eastleigh owner Stewart Donald has opened the door to a Silverlake Stadium return after reducing his stake in Sunderland.

Donald, who was previously Eastleigh's chairman for seven years, left the Hampshire club to join Sunderland as they looked to bounce straight back to the Championship.

The 47-year-old was chosen to be the leader of a consortium offering to purchase the Black Cats in 2018 after they were put up to sale by billionaire owner Ellis Short.

Donald has now taken a step back at Sunderland and reduced his stake to just nine per cent, allowing him to resume what he labels as unfinished business with the Spitfires.

“It means under the rules that I can go to another club if there is a deal to be done. I’ve had a chat with the owners at Sunderland and they’re really enjoying it, I’ve passed it onto them,” Donald explained, in a new interview with BBC Radio Solent.

“It’s been a gradual thing. They’ve had a look at it, we’ve had conversations and he wants to get more involved and that works for me.

“I like being involved at a football club but at Sunderland it has changed to just writing s cheque if needed, as a minority investor role. They make all the decisions as they should.

“For me, that’s a much lesser role than the one I left to go and do. But its an amazing football club and it’s all happened so quickly, I’d like to retain the 9 per cent at Sunderland because I love it.”

After buying the club in the Conference South in 2010, Donald helped oversee Eastleigh’s promotion to the National League and an initial qualification for the playoffs. 

They were unsuccessful in their first attempt and the club would not finish in the top seven again until 2019, after Donald departed, but are looking to again this season under manager Lee Bradbury.

The Spitfires are currently eight points clear of the next chasing team outside of the playoffs, sitting in sixth after 39 of their games have been played.

Donald outlined what his potential return would look like, adding: “I’d like to be involved like I was at Sunderland at Eastleigh, with the day-to-day running of the club.

“I’m the landlord here and there is lots to do developing the ground, it was unfinished business when I left.

“I wasn’t looking to leave but Sunderland landed on the mat and how could you not get involved? There’s a big potential for me to come back if the Eastleigh shareholders are willing to do a deal.

“The reality of it is you don’t want to rock the boat, they’re doing ever so well and there is no need to do anything right this second,” Donald admitted.

“Every time my shareholding has gone down at Sunderland, Kenny (Amor) and Tom (Coffey) had been asking ‘what does that mean?'

"It’s no secret when I left the budget for the club was way higher than it could afford and I left the money in for them to have a few seasons, COVID hit, there are some debts here, and the rent is behind shall we say.

“The money I’ve left over the years they have done ever so well to make it stretch this long but it will be a different season next year unless they get some investment in.

"If it all makes sense, I’ll look to pick up where I left off and see if we can continue this journey.”