Ground Floor / Sheila O'Flanagan: In all of the media stories surrounding the bid for Marks & Spencer by Philip Green, the most headline-grabbing has to be the fact that he and Stuart Rose, its brand-new chief executive, almost came to blows outside the M&S headquarters in London's Baker Street.

According to some reports, Green is said to have grabbed Rose by his suit collar and berated him for joining the company rather than joining his bidding-team, telling him (if that's quite the right phrase) that he could have made a fortune if he'd stuck with him - a quarter of a million sterling, by all accounts. Apparently Green then called his wife on his mobile phone and handed it to Rose so that he could receive more abuse from her. (Behind every successful man and all that sort of thing obviously.)

Rose has now admitted that he already knew about the potential bid for the company before he joined, because Green had told him about it. In fact, they'd discussed it in the days before he took the job offer.

I'm not surprised Green was a bit peeved. One day you're having these deep discussions about making a bid for a company, the next your potential partner has become the person you're trying to wrest the company from. And he has information about your plans.

Anyway, a long friendship seems to have bitten the dust over the M&S issue, because ultimately Rose wanted to be the top man and not Green's gofer.

There has been some speculation that the knowledge of Green's potential bid will mean that Rose is questioned by the FSA which is investigating the dramatic rise in the share price. They'll want to know whether Rose benefited from his knowledge of the bid. You'd like to think that his £1.25 million (€1.87 million) golden hello was benefit enough but, as we know, no executive thinks any sum is too big or too small these days.

Anyway, amid all of the intense analyst scrutiny of the worth of Green's bid, Rose's rebuttal and the future of the eponymous store, it still comes down to a pitched battle between the two men who share a history in the world of retailing.

Greens bought Rose out before when he was chief executive of the Arcadia Group. If he's to do it again, Rose will want it to be on his terms because the consensus is that he thinks he sold Arcadia too cheaply. But, of course, the party line is currently that he's at M&S to drive the business forward, not to sell it.

Whether the city analysts either believe in him or have faith in him to achieve that objective is still very much open to question. He already has M&S experience gained from 1971-89 where he worked his way up from a trainee manager before moving to Burton and ultimately Arcadia. His reputation, though, is not really that of a long-term retailer; rather, he has been accused of re-packaging pressurised companies and then selling them to the highest bidder and collecting a fat payoff for himself even though he may initially appear hostile to the bid.

There's no doubt, though, that the share prices of the companies for which he has worked do rise while he's at the helm - whether that's because shareholders really believe that he can deliver or whether it's because they hope he's going to make a decent sale is the question.

Green is usually on the other side of the bring-and-buy fence, being the person who buys faltering companies and turns them into lean, mean cash-generating machines.

He wanted to have a tilt at M&S before but was stymied and so went on to other things. But he still itched to get his fingers on the group, feeling that it wasn't being run to its full potential. (He isn't, obviously, alone in that!)

When he took control of Arcadia, Green practically doubled its operating profit in the first year. He turned Bhs and Topshop around by relentless cost cutting and demanding aggressive terms when dealing with suppliers - a tactic that leaves both staff and suppliers of M&S feeling anxious about the result of the current battle.

The views of the institutional shareholders are mixed. Some want to give Rose the benefit of time to see whether or not he can turn things around. They like his talk of quality, service, value and innovation - the principles of the M&S brand. And his earthy descriptions of his more successful predecessors who came up through the ranks the hard way and had "their arses kicked". They think he can deliver shareholder value.

But then, so can Philip Green. And he's proved it. He's now the fourth richest man in the UK and he's done it in retailing. He has the mentality that has made Zara (not one of his stores!) so successful. If it sells more, make more. If it doesn't, get rid of it. He says he's not good at fashion but he's good at selling it. He hasn't really taken much heed, so far, of the other M&S ranges - food, home and beauty.

In reality they're probably the areas of the shop that are doing the best although the furniture division is supposedly behind targets. But the food, though expensive, is invariably excellent and great for faking that home cooked look!

Despite extensive competition from almost everywhere, their soaps and smellies remain good value and their cosmetics department is great, with the Autograph range of products being particularly attractively packaged. I've never been one for the seduction of a €100 pot of cream to ward off the fine lines but I have occasionally tried them. And, to be honest, I haven't found any better than the M&S product for a tenner.

Maybe Stuart Rose might give it a try himself. I reckon there's still a lot of brow-wrinkling to go before M&S moves forward.