Still on that Merrill Lynch report, which casts its eyes over three of Glanbia's main rivals in the British milk business without looking at the Irish group at all. Dairy Crest, Express and Robert Wiseman are all given "accumulate" tags - the usual brokerspeak, indicating that if you want an exposure to the British milk business then these are the vehicles to use - and not Glanbia.

Of all the dairy processors in Britain, the Scotland-based Wiseman has been the most expansionary - first moving from its Scottish heartland to take on Glanbia in its own Manchester backyard. Now Wiseman is going ahead with a greenfield milk processing plant in the Birmingham area, without even having tied up a major retail multiple which would be an anchor customer for its £30 million (€38 million) investment.

Wiseman boss Alan Wiseman laid it on the line this week.

He said that his group aims to jump from sixth to fourth in the British milk league table, leapfrogging over Glanbia, and only lagging behind Express, Unigate and MD Foods. The belief in the milk trade in Britain is that Wiseman is targeting Glanbia's milk supply contract with Tesco as the anchor contract for its new Birmingham plant and as the way to boost its market share from 12 per cent to 15 per cent.

If Wiseman does manage to boost its market position in Britain at the expense of Glanbia, it would inevitably boost the Scottish group's ability to be a major player in the restructuring of the industry and would weaken Glanbia's bargaining position if and when the industry gets around to serious talks on rationalisation.

That largely explains the latest weakness in the Glanbia shares - down to €1.65 this week - from €2.67 at the beginning of the year and €4.53 in early 1998.