Portsmouth have failed to pay their players again, having missed the original payment date last Thursday. It was the fourth time over the course of three separate months that the club have missed a deadline to pay the squad's wages. They have informed the Professional Footballers Association that the players will be paid tomorrow.

Earlier Daniel Azougy, the Israeli lawyer hired by the club to drum up investment to aid the club's dire financial position, admitted that they are in a "mess" but claimed that the owner, Ali al-Faraj, will have paid £40m to creditors by 10 January, when he is hoping the embargo on registering new players will be lifted.

Yet if the club cannot source the £1.8m required to pay the players then the prospects of removing the embargo would seem to be ever more remote. Their liability to other English clubs for transfers is around £10m, though even if these monies are paid the Premier League will demand that further unpayable liabilities will not be accrued. The league has said that Portsmouth will not be able to reregister Jamie O'Hara, one of this season's better performers, as a loan signing from Tottenham unless the transfer embargo is lifted.

Regarding the missing salaries, the PFA's chief executive, Gordon Taylor, said: "We were expecting the players to be paid today but that has not happened. We have been told by the club that they are hopeful of paying them tomorrow [Wednesday]."

On Saturday supporters' growing frustration was expressed following the 1-1 draw with Coventry City in the FA Cup third round when around 150 fans gathered outside the directors' entrance to protest against the lack of information given by Faraj's regime.

Speaking publicly for the first time, Azougy said that he understands the fans' emotions, claiming "we are also frustrated", and said a statement would be released by the executive director, Mark Jacob, that would "explain everything". Yet this only added to the confusion as Jacob then said he would not be speaking publicly.

Azougy, who is on a short-term contract with Portsmouth, claimed that the club's problems – Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs also served the club with a winding-up petition on 23 December – are the fault of the previous two owners, Sulaiman al-Fahim and Sacha Gaydamak.

Gaydamak, though, claims he is owed £28m by the club and last week demanded clarity regarding who is the "ultimate beneficial owner" of Portsmouth.

Fahim, still the non-executive chairman, has stated he plans to give his 10% stake in the club to the recently formed Pompey Supporters' Trust.

Azougy added: "First of all, I hope we are going to pay the players' salaries as promised. But nobody knows how much [the club] is a mess. When people and the fans know how big, they will appreciate what we are trying to do. We thought the mess was just £5m or £10m. It is more than £40m, so the figures are not as is assumed. But I can tell you that from the day that the new owners come [5 October] until the 10 January the creditors of Portsmouth Football Club will be paid £40m. It's not a small amount, and we didn't finish yet.

"We didn't realise how big the problems were – many mistakes were made before the takeover and now we are trying to put, piece by piece, everything back in order, and I hope we will succeed. We are working seven days, all day long to make it good. But it's not easy.

"You will have all these figures later, all the details of how the £40m was paid. Mark Jacob [the club's executive director] will give a statement. We have answers to everything but we didn't give it the right way to newspapers until now, so you will have all the answers there and you can check everything."

The chief executive, Peter Storrie, stated in October – before Faraj's takeover – that £35m had gone to Standard Bank and Gaydamak claimed he paid off £2.5m to Barclays the same month. It is not clear what the claimed amount of £40m debt would include.

Previous instalments owed for transfers, further debts to HMRC plus the missing salaries of the previous two months may factor in the amount.

Azougy also claimed that despite their difficulties, Portsmouth have some advantages. "All the other clubs are very stressed now, they all need money – it's not just our problem," he said. "The good thing is Portsmouth has no bank facility, nothing, zero, not even one penny. There is no club in the Premier League that [doesn't] have [a] bank facility."