We know what the likley response will be about those F class pax (and also with the reputedly healthy bookings for F class on EK) is that they are only feeding into a hub and so not really useful for an airline operating on a point to point basis. But if you aren’t willing to try, you will definitely get no passengers booking F out of a regional.

I can’t say I’ve ever heard that argument from anyone, it is a ludicrous one! Emirates certainly aren’t targeting the point to point market especially not in their premium cabins.

Manchester has always had a small but strong First Class demand, in the past it flowed almost entirely through Heathrow. These days a lot of it still flows down through London (BA certainly don’t continue to fly MAN-LHR for economy point to point traffic!) but more and more are moving out onto the new big seats out of the regions.