Quinn is heading up a consortium, which includes four Irish businessmen, which will take control of the struggling club in a deal believed to be worth in the region of £70m ( 101m).

Although Quinn's intended role in the new setup has not been made public, sources close to the deal have said that the retired striker will become chairman.

The consortium hopes to get the green light for the takeover tomorrow, hours before the club is due to take on Arsenal. It is expected that the deal will take upwards of a month to conclude.

The Irish consortion will buy the club from current chairman Bob Murray for £20m, as well as wiping the club's debt, which is around £40m.

Sources close to the consortium say that despite the club's relegation they hope to attract a top manager.

At tomorrow night's game against Arsenal fans will honour Quinn in the traditional manner . . . with a few renditions of their now famous fan anthem 'Niall Quinn's Disco Pants'.

Quinn is being hailed as the saviour of a club desperately in need of saving. The Dublin-born footballer, who retired from the playing side of the game in 2002, has long been seen as an iconic figure in the red-and-white corner of northeast England. With a reasonably impressive tally of 69 goals in 212 appearances, Quinn's six-year stint at the club was one of the bright marks in what has been a rollercoaster period for the team known as the Black Cats.

However, this season has been a complete disaster. Until recently under the guidance of Mick McCarthy . . . with whom Quinn famously sided during the Roy Keane dispute in Saipan four years ago . . . the club has endured one of the worst seasons in English football history, managing just two wins from 35 attempts. With a paltry 23 goals all season, the club has a worse scoring record than an Amish stag party.

After sacking McCarthy early last month, chairman Bob Murray has now set his sights upon his own departure. Indeed, it was Murray who first planted the notion of buying Sunderland AFC in Quinn's head. The pair met socially in Dublin last summer and the chairman encouraged his former star player to find a consortium to purchase the club.

Quinn has since put together that consortium, having convinced four as yet unnamed Irish businessmen to stump up £20m in order to relieve Murray of his position. The club officially announced the takeover bid to the stock exchange on Friday, ending weeks of speculation that Quinn and his disco pants were about to strike.

But what exactly is Quinn getting himself in for? On the pitch, Sunderland have been caught in a yo-yo situation for the last number of years . . . too strong for the Championship but too weak for the Premiership, the club has been up and down for most of the decade.

Off the pitch, the business structure of the club appears to be relatively sound. However, in a sport in which only the very top clubs can hope to even break even, perhaps relatively is the key word in that sentence.

Already relegated from the Premiership, the club will operate on a vastly reduced budget next season. The wage bill will have to be cut, although transfer fees won't necessarily be an issue if the club decided that McCarthy's mediocre signings might be enough to secure a return to the top flight once again.

In football, however, just as in politics, most careers end in failure, and Quinn would be advised to look back on the career of Bob Murray before he takes the fatal leap into the football boardroom, a bizarre world where astute businessmen often leave logic at the door and begin acting like children locked inside a toy shop.

Murray acquired a controlling stake in Sunderland AFC in 1986, when the club was heading towards the old third division and appeared to be in terminal decline. In the 20 years of Murray's reign, the club has endured five relegations and as many promotions.

However, the miner's son from Sunderland is weary and has stated his desire to sell-up. Speaking to the Sunderland Echo newspaper, he admitted that Quinn is the man groomed to succeed him.

"I'm proud of what I've achieved here, I've done an awful lot in 20 years on the board, " he said.

"I've been a fan for 51 years and I'm awesomely proud of what I've achieved. . . I've always wanted Niall to buy the club from me, and I've gone all out to get what I want."

However, winning the adoration of the supporters in the boardroom is an entirely different proposition to winning them over on the pitch.

Even in the absence of St Niall's Day, Quinn will receive a tremendous response from the Sunderland supporters when he appears at tomorrow night's game against Arsenal, coincidentally the club at which the Dubliner began his professional career at roughly the same time Bob Murray was taking over Sunderland all those years ago.

Murray has laid the foundations of a successful club, but has ultimately been unable to guide them to the promised land of English football . . . a sustained spell in the Premiership.

Quinn is adored by the fans but reaching that promised land is a huge task.