A rare 1930s Lagonda sports car bought for just £200 by Oxford peer Lord Berkeley is expected to fetch up to £50,000 at an auction on Saturday.

That's the good news.

The bad news is that Lord Berkeley — Oxford-based chairman of the Rail Freight Group — has spent £97,000 restoring it.

Lord Berkeley — who will be 69 next week — bought the rare 1931 two-litre machine from a fellow Cambridge undergraduate in 1961.

Now he is selling the car which he has owned for 47 years and it will be auctioned by Bonhams at the National Motor Museum at Beaulieu, in Hampshire.

The car cost £720 new when it was built in 1931.

About 1,300 Lagondas were built — and according to the Lagonda Club only about 350 have survived.

Lord Berkeley is a hereditary peer and a Life Peer. Former Prime Minister Tony Blair gave him a life peerage in 2000, so he is also Lord Gueterbock, although to his friends he is known as Tony.

Aston Martin, which owns the Lagonda brand, recently announced plans to relaunch the marque.