Just as a follow up to this.
When I arrived at MAN, you can see through to the security queuing 'pen' area as you walk through the main entrance doors.
The area was surprisingly very empty, so I thought I'll just turn up at the desks and see what happens....
As it was, one of the two 'bag drop' desks was free whilst there was a queue at business check in, so I went to the bag drop desk as I had already checked in online the previous night (just in case!).
No fast track offered.
No priority baggage tags attached.

Whether this was due to me not rocking up at the business desk where they would have the appropriate tags / tickets, I'm unsure, but hey - made little difference on the day.

As an aside, was stunned to be greeted by both the purser and SFS on the outbound 777leg (and was given fastrack immigration tickets before even taking off from MAN by another member of cabin crew!) and was greeted by a profusely apologetic SFS on the return A380 who couldn't apologise enough for not coming to greet me before takeoff (she managed it about an hour into the flight)
Certainly an improvement on previous Y experiences as a gold............
Although the tea and coffee was still stone cold by the time they served it