The idea of Liverpool being forced to sell Fernando Torres, the club's star player this season, will be of grave concern to the fans making the long trip to London for this afternoon's game away to Fulham.

Although unlikely, this nightmare scenario is possible because of the club's mounting debts brought about by the squabbling of Tom Hicks and George Gillett Jr, the controversial American owners.

This is no way to run a football club. You cannot refinance hopes and dreams. However, with football clubs now big business, they too are as vulnerable as our high street banks to global financial volatility. Yet there is a big difference, when a football club runs into financial difficulties - it's not just the shareholders who suffer, it is whole communities, towns and cities. The departure of a star centre forward is a much more bitter pill to swallow than when your run-of-the-mill company director moves on.

It must be emphasised that by no means are Liverpool staring into the financial abyss at the moment, and a forced sale of Torres is far from imminent.

Should the club fail to refinance their debts and default on the loans, the banks will take control - but a buyer will always be found. There will always be another foreign billionaire keen to be a part of the magic of the Premier League and - particularly - Liverpool, one of the world's most valuable football brands.

In fact those in Dubai would quite happily take control tomorrow, if only Hicks and Gillett could decide what to do. The battle for control will rumble on for at least a few more weeks, with Dubai International Capital, the investment arm of the Arab state's government, unwilling to raise its £500million offer.

Liverpool will also benefit in the future from the proposed move to a new stadium in Stanley Park. Fans filling the new ground should still be able to enjoy Torres, Steven Gerrard and the rest.

However, spare a thought for the fans of Bournemouth, and others at the less glamorous end of the Football League, who have not slept easy this week. The South Coast side's debts have forced them into administration and a points deduction, although, thankfully for their supporters, a last-gasp deal appears to have been struck. Meanwhile, up in Scotland Gretna's meteoric rise no longer looks so heroic, with no certainty of any future finance.

With the money men being more selective with whom they lend to, and increasingly asking for more in return, football clubs and their supporters will feel the pinch. Over the course of the year it will be no surprise to see a number of clubs become casualties of the credit crunch.

Larger clubs should take heed of this warning for they are not untouchable and carry the burden of the most debt of all. However unlikely a worst-case scenario might be for Liverpool, it should never be a possibility for a football club.