OPNION: Another Blackpool court case passes with little progress

We’re now nearing the one-year anniversary of November’s court judgement, when Owen Oyston was told he must pay £31.27m.

A sum of around £25m, if not higher, still remains and yet not a great deal seems to be getting done about it.

Questions must now be asked of Valeri Belokon, whose lawyers Clifford Chance could have made an application for a court receiver to be appointed. In fact, the suggestion came from the judge himself.

So why isn’t Belokon pushing harder? All this does is allow Oyston more time to stall, something he is already the master of.

In the meantime he continues to make a mockery of last year’s judgement.

The 84-year-old was given nothing more than a slap on the wrist for “disobeying” several court orders. Oyston couldn’t even be bothered turning up to the hearing.

Some have blamed the court system for the recent delays but they can only do so much – they have to consider the applications in front of them.

The power has been in Belokon’s hands since July when an order allowing the Latvian to take Oyston’s assets to auction came into effect. Yet very little has happened since then, other than a meeting with Oyston in Riga which, as expected, resulted in diddly squat.

Belokon appears happy to sit back and wait for Oyston to raise the funds from sales. But if that’s the tactic he’s employing, he’ll be waiting a long time. Oyston doesn’t do anything he doesn’t have to.

Many already suspected Belokon had no interest in the football club and that list of people is growing longer by the week. But you would expect he wants his money back, so why the wait?

Yet again it’s the fans of Blackpool Football Club who suffer.