Leaving aside the purely airline business fallout of the situation I wonder what the "political" view of this would be in Ireland. The Irish Government has steadfastly opposed any and all attempts at a takeover of EI by their very own major airline success story and I suspect the same government may be secretly hoping that FR will be forced to shed all or at least part of their current EI holding. So, how would it look at home if they were then to agree to sell out to, let's face it, a British operation?