Two former EU competition commissioners are expected to be involved in drawing up the Aer Lingus competition case against Ryanair's €1.4 billion bid for the airline. Mario Monti and Karel van Miert both now act as advisers to Goldman Sachs, which is financial adviser to Aer Lingus.
The airline has asked Goldman Sachs to prepare a defence to the hostile takeover by Ryanair and this includes preparing a regulatory and competition case against the takeover offer.
The offer made by Michael O'Leary last week is set to become one of the biggest competition cases heard in the European airline sector for many years.
Strong attempts are being made to block the €2.80-a-share Ryanair bid, announced last Thursday. An employee shareholding group, the Employee Share Ownership Trust (Esot), and a group of pilots are understood to be considering purchasing additional shares in an attempt to frustrate the Ryanair bid.
Opponents of the bid believe if up to 10 per cent of the airline's equity - over the State and Esot stakes - can be kept away from Mr O'Leary, his chances of getting more than 50 per cent will be frustrated. A group called Tailwind Nominees has already taken up shares on behalf of a group of pilots.
The legal department of Goldman Sachs is expected to be involved primarily in preparing the Aer Lingus defence, but it is expected that Mr Monti and Mr van Miert will be consulted at some point. The chairman of Goldman Sachs International is another former EU commissioner, Peter Sutherland. The Government and Aer Lingus are pinning their hopes on Ryanair's bid failing to pass the various regulatory and competition hurdles.
Even if the offer gets competition approval, this may still come with stringent conditions attached, including Ryanair having to shed some of its routes or landing slots.
Mr Monti developed a fearsome reputation as a competition watchdog between 1999 and 2004. Dubbed "super-Mario" for high-profile campaigns against powerful multi-nationals like Microsoft, Mr Monti also effectively forced EMI and Time Warner to call off their merger plans and AOL Europe to cut its ties to media giant Bertelsmann.
Mr van Miert was EU competition commissioner between 1993 and 1999.