It has taken two-and-a-half years for Oxford City Council to concede that we have a right to know some of the details behind the deal that led to Firoz Kassam building a new stadium for Oxford United, a hotel and leisure park.

Our request for the valuations used by the council in agreeing the deal and for the terms of the deal with Mr Kassam was made under the Freedom of Information Act in 2005.

The council has held out - even in the face of a ruling by the Information Commissioner that it should release all the documents - on the grounds that there are third parties and confidentiality clauses involved.

The council's appeal against the commissioner's ruling is due to be held shortly. The only outstanding issue now is the exact terms on which Mr Kassam acquired the land for the stadium, hotel and leisure complex. Those terms have still not been released by the council and we will continue to pursue them.

We have reported in the past a figure of £1.294m that Mr Kassam paid for the land.

The Rapleys valuation gives a figure of about £3m for the land on which the leisure complex and hotel were built.

It appears Mr Kassam got the land for less than half what the city council knew it was worth.

We know that the District Auditor had almost as much trouble getting to the bottom of this deal as we did. He eventually concluded that the council probably got best value for the taxpayer. One cannot help feeling that the probabilities lie the opposite way.

We do have sympathy for the councillors faced with the decisions. Their considerations were more political than financial.

Firoz Kassam was the only player in town. He held the cards that would ensure the future of Oxford United and he clearly played them well. He is a businessman and you would expect no less.

If you are a fan of Oxford United, it probably looks like a good deal. If you have no interest in football at all, it certainly does not.

For sure, Oxford got a stadium for its football club. Let us not forget, however, that Mr Kassam sold the football club but still owns the stadium.

In effect, the city council subsidised the building of a stadium that in 2007 Oxford United Football Club does not own.