What "behaviour"? It wasn't kicked out of a club, it withdrew and maintained the key relationships it needed (BA mostly, but also QF, CX and AA for a while). It's not like they jilted someone at the alter.

It refused to pay the necessary fees to enable connectivity between it and JL. Also it's model was deemed to be too much on the low cost side of the equation (the irony is that BA seems to be following in it's path these days!).

Don't forget the EI has a fair portion of it's shares owned by the dreaded O'Leary camp over at FR so I don't see FR willingly handing over those shares to BA.

I don't think it was so much "refused" but didn't see the point - it would be a lot of money to invest for relatively little benefit in terms of passengers coming from JL and RJ etc. Certainly at a time when cash was pretty thin on the ground for them and the then CEO wasn't looking outwards. As for the low-cost aspect, it didn't bother OW so much when Aer Lingus remained within the alliance, but it was the big reason EI pulled out - for EI the negatives of remaining in OW at that time outweighed the benefits.

They've softened their aggressive LCC strategy in some respects since the new CEO came on board, and realise that point-to-point travellers aren't the be all and end all and that trying to beat Ryanair in that market is a mugs game. They're slightly coming around the point that business/frequent travellers still use them (introducing new flexible fares, refreshing lounges, new long-haul J product, links with United etc). Thinking about alliances again makes sense if they want to follow that line of thinking.

I doubt FR's shenanigans would present a problem providing BA could acquire a voting majority. The challenge would be convincing the govt to sell its shares.

Given the dire state of the public finances - and the recent establishment of a review group to determine the best "use" of 28 commercial state bodies - I wouldn't be surprised but that the government would be willing to sell their Aer Lingus stake to the "right" bidder.

Didn't Mick just sell of a chunk of his FR stock to raise cash for one thing or the other?

Is he going for Aer Finglas I wonder? Not buying for FR but himself that is...

The Irish Government doesn't care who buys as long as they get the cash in unmarked bills ;)