Stuart Draper, head of research at Dolmen, told the Sunday Tribune that by not properly considering the longterm value of its 33-acre land bank the MBO team had left sufficient clearance for a much higher bid from a competitor when it submitted its original offer valuing ICG at Euro471m.

The One51/Doyle shipping consortium, which yesterday increased its combined stake in the shipping group to 20% at a share price of Euro20.75, will most likely put forward an offer of around Euro21 per share when it completes the due diligence process it began this weekend, Draper said.

The MBO team now faces countering with a new offer approaching Euro22 per share or conceding defeat. A bid at that level would put the value of ICG at more than Euro500m.

Other analysts said management probably didn't have the appetite to compete at that price.

"At Euro21 per share you'd need to extract value from the property to make the deal generate sufficient returns, " Draper said. While the main value in the company would come from the shipping business, the development potential in ICG's port acreage would provide the upside to the One51/Doyle bid and any counter offer by the MBO team.

"At this price, there's not a lot of return on investment from the shipping business, " he said.

In a mid-week note, Draper argued that the then-putative bid of Euro20.50 per share was consistent with recent takeprivate deals among ICG's peers and that the value of its property could justify a Euro22 per share bid.

Most of the speculation regarding the One51/Doyle consortium's motives has focused on the likelihood that they were attracted by a pure property play. Some commentators pointed to last year's Euro17m per acre South Wharf sale of the Ardagh Glass site in the south Docklands as a gauge. ICG values its Dublin Port land at only Euro530,000 per acre. ICG chairman John McGuckian said at the group's EGM on Thursday that the property's value was fairly reflected in the MBO team's bid price, suggesting the independent directors who had recommended the deal to shareholders had discounted the long term value of the land that the competing consortium is believed to see.

McGuckian based his judgment on the land's 150-year lease and a covenant restricting its use to ferry terminal activities.

Draper believes the One51/Doyle consortium can probably overcome the restrictions in the long term - as the South Wharf buyers did - and that its plan is to move the shipping business to Greenore, Co Louth, in which One51 has a 50% stake, and develop the property. Alternatively, it could sell the shipping business altogether.

Another source close to the company suggested, however, that the property play was a red herring and that Greenore would not be sufficiently attractive to ICG's port users to justify the move, should that be in the consortium's plans. He said One51/Doyle had boxed itself into a corner and might be more interested in block management's bid that in tabling an offer of its own until had regrouped and reconsidered.