This wasn’t the sale RailHawks fans were expecting to be announced — or the method involved.

Almost two weeks after the franchise told the town of Cary it would hold a press conference to introduce its new ownership group, almost every piece of the team’s merchandise, office supplies and equipment was put on sale inside the team’s locker room Thursday through Saturday. Even the name itself appears to be part of the fire sale.

As of 12:30 p.m. on Saturday, the team posted the sale of its “rights, title, and … Carolina RailHawks brand, including the common law trademarked team name and all associated logos, symbols, designs, slogans, and mascot, and the internet domain name www.carolinarailhawks.com” on eBay. The bidding was at $5,300 as two accounts had gone back and forth on the bidding.

One of the bidders is believed to be Traffic Sports USA, the group which has stakes in three other teams in the proposed North American Soccer League and was in negotiations with outgoing owners Selby and Brian Wellman after a previous deal with local investors broke down in December.

Fans were invited to come by WakeMed Soccer Park to place silent auction bids on plasma-screen TVs, office furniture and coolers while game-worn jerseys, merchandise and office supplies were sold as cash-only.

“This whole thing is part of the legal process that goes with the dissolution,” David Vaught said.

The RailHawks dissolved their LLC on Dec. 31 of last year. The team is still operating. Last week, coach Martin Rennie held invited tryouts for next year, season ticket packages are advertised on the website and the 2011 schedule was released on Tuesday — thought there was no mention of the name “RailHawks.”

“We’ll figure it out soon enough whether it’s a new name or the same name or exactly who’s in charge,” said Rennie, whose office is adjacent to the locker room where all the sales were being made. “It sounds like just a process that a dissolved company normally goes through.”

The NASL took a massive hit last Friday when the United States Soccer Federation announced it was withdrawing its provisional sanctioning of the NASL as a division 2 soccer league. The USSF provisionally sanctioned NASL as a division 2 league in November, but developments have changed the facts of the original NASL proposal — none bigger than the RailHawks’ pending sale to Traffic Sports — and kept NASL from meeting all the new USSF requirements for second-division status.

Despite the setback, NASL said in a press release that the league would re-submit its bid for sanctioning as a Division 2 league, the designation right below Major League Soccer. The USSF will vote on that application on Feb. 11 or 12.

“The USSF and the soccer community have realized that it’s time once and for all to launch a new second division with higher standards which finally ensure the stability, growth and prosperity of second division soccer in North America,” NASL CEO and Traffic Sports president Aaron Davidson said in a statement.

“We are prepared to respond to the USSF’s concerns and look forward to delivering on our commitments to our teams and fans to re-launch second division as the NASL in 2011.”

NASL could theoretically apply as a third-division league, though one is already in place with USL Pro.

If NASL’s re-submitted application is not approved, the league members will be faced with only a handful of choices: play in an unsanctioned league, join USL Pro, go dark for 2011 or fold altogether.