I heard most of the 7 were ex Eir-Jet. Spoke to a guy who went for interview who reckoned that unless you were available at short notice they weren't that interested but he did say the plan was interview, sim-check, medical. He also claimed that many of those that went for interview were more curious than anything else and the interviewers didn't seem to know what the actual package was.
Maybe this is all a big conspiracy theory to let the opposition drop its guard! The Easyjet guys seemed quite concerned initially that Aer Lingus were hell bent on taking them on in their own patch. Now their attitude is more of 'yeah whatever'.