Sheikh Jassim bin Hamad al-Thani could be the chosen one to buy Manchester United ahead of Sir Jim Rarcliffe, with each party due to hold its first face-to-face meeting with the club this week. 

The Qatari banker's representatives are expected to meet the hierarchy in Manchester on Thursday. Reports suggest that Thani is the favored bidder of the Glazers due, in part, to his potential to open up business opportunities in his region to US owners. 

There's also a sense that the Glazers haven't warmed up to Ratcliffe, the owner of Ineos and Britain's richest man, who is due to visit United on Friday with advisers. He intends to travel after watching Nice play Sheriff in the Europa Conference League on Thursday.

Elliott attended the first face-to-face meeting on the sale last Thursday's Europa League final-16 first-leg victory over Real Betis at Old Trafford.

The president of Uefa, Aleksander Ceferin, has suggested that the prohibition against clubs with the same owners competing in the same European tournament might be lifted. Nice and Lausanne-Sport are owned by Ineos, and Paris Saint-Germain is owned by Qatar Sports Investments (QSI). According to Thani, he is not a part of QSI.

Ceferin told Gary Neville’s The Overlap YouTube channel: “We are not thinking about Manchester United only. We’ve had five or six owners of clubs who want to buy another club. We have to see what to do. The options are that it stays like that or that we allow them to play in the same competition. I’m not sure yet."

“We have to speak about these regulations and see what to do about it. There is more and more interest in this multi-club ownership. We shouldn’t just say no to the investments for multi-club ownership, but we have to see what kind of rules we set in that case because the rules have to be strict.”

The club announced on Wednesday that they would tour the US in the summer, with San Diego, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, and New York thought to be destinations for several games.