Hull City have begun legal proceedings against former chairman Paul Duffen after accusing him of spending company money for his own personal use.

The Premier League club also alleges Duffen's company received payments from agents in return for using those agents to deal with the transfer of players.

Duffen denied the allegations at a preliminary hearing at the High Court in London on Friday.

A date for the trial of the issues has not been fixed.

An order freezing Duffen's assets made last Friday was lifted and substituted with an order to value and place a charge on a property but orders for disclosure and charges over a property have been agreed. Duffen also agreed to hand over computer files.

Duffen's barrister, Lexa Hilliard QC, told Mrs Justice Proudman that although Mr Duffen had consented to the orders "this was not to be taken as an admission by my client of any of the allegations against him".

Earlier on Friday, Hull said in a statement: "The company believes that Mr Duffen has acted in breach of his employment contracts and fiduciary duties as a director, through the use of company monies for his own personal expenditure and other wrongdoings.

"The company also believes that he has acted in breach of his employment contracts and fiduciary duties as a director, through the payment of certain monies by third party football agents to Mr Duffen's services company, in return for which Mr Duffen procured that Hull City contract with the agents for business.

"Consequently, on 15 January last, the company successfully sought and obtained a High Court order freezing Mr Duffen's assets.

"The company also wishes to clarify that, contrary to a tabloid newspaper article today, Mr Duffen has not issued any legal proceedings against the company and Hull City does not believe he has any basis whatsoever for doing so."

However, BBC Radio 5 live's Brian Alexander said that Duffen told him before Christmas that he had begun his own proceedings against Hull to recover almost £1m, and that he was fully expecting the club to to hit back.

Alexander also revealed that Duffen told him on Friday that the allegations about agents and breach of contract were "ridiculous", adding that he was happy for this matter to be settled by the courts and fully expected the case to take a year to be completed.

Earlier this month new Hull chairman Adam Pearson claimed there had "not been enough care and attention done to the transfers and the deals".

Duffen was part of a consortium that bought the Tigers from Pearson in June 2007, the year before they were promoted to the Premier League.

They began the 2008-09 season well but struggled towards the end of the season and only escaped relegation on the last day of the campaign.

Duffen stepped down as executive chairman of the club and Superstadium Management Company Ltd in October 2009, with Pearson returning to the club as chairman.

At the time, a formal statement said the club "wishes to express its gratitude to Paul for his outstanding contribution as chairman during a period of unprecedented success for Hull City AFC."

Manager Phil Brown said "we have had tremendous unprecedented success during his time at the club and I would personally like to thank him for all his support."

But in December 2009, Pearson said he was calling in auditors to try and sort out the club's finances, after their 2008 figures revealed a shortfall of around £16m.

BBC SPORT