Investment bank Lazard has returned to advise Esporta on rescue options five years after the bank acted for the leisure firm during a hostile takeover by Duke Street Capital.

Having defended Esporta in vain as it battled against Duke Street's hostile takeover in 2002, Lazard is now understood to be courting expressions of interest from private equity firms as administrators seek to "facilitate a financial restructuring of Bell Leisure's capital structure or an appropriate sale".