In the unlikely setting of a racetrack outside Dublin, Ireland's Charlie McCreevy will chair two days of informal talks trying to decide a candidate to succeed Germany's Horst Koehler at the International Monetary Fund.

"It is hoped to get a decision at Punchestown," said an Irish spokesman, referring to the racecourse southwest of the Irish capital, although he stressed that there is no imminent deadline for agreeing a candidate.

The talks will also broach a brewing row over the EU's future budget, with six big net contributor states pushing to keep a firm grip on the purse strings of the expanding bloc, which takes in 10 new relatively poor members on May 1.

But the IMF decision, while not formally on the agenda, is expected to overshadow the meeting.

The race is increasingly shaping up as a two-horse competition between outgoing Spanish Economy Minister Rodrigo Rato and the French head of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, Jean Lemierre.

Koehler announced his resignation as the IMF chief on March 4 to run for president in his native Germany, for which he is widely seen as a shoo-in in May elections.

Since the founding of the IMF and the World Bank in 1944, the managing director of the IMF has by custom been a European and the president of the World Bank an American.