Safeway's stalkers will meet the Competition Commission in early July for update meetings when they will be given indications of the likelihood of bids being passed by the regulatory watchdog.
The Commission will meet with each potential bidder - Tesco, Sainsbury's, Wal-Mart/Asda and Morrisons - individually in 'remedies meetings'.
Supermarket bosses will be told how many stores they may have to unload to have a chance of bagging Safeway.
One source said: 'The Competition Commission will offer advice to the candidates behind closed doors. They are more like speculative suggestions, rather than hard proposals.'
The Commission has collated all the information arising from meetings last week with prospective Safeway buyers and will not meet the grocers again until the remedies meetings.
JPMorgan retail analyst Matthias Reschke said in a note that he believed Morrisons would win the battle for Safeway.
He said: 'Little is certain about the final outcome, but we expect Morrisons will be allowed to bid and Tesco will not.
'Therefore the key question is whether Sainsbury's and Wal-Mart will be allowed to bid, but it is difficult to come up with a clear reason why Sainsbury's should be allowed and Wal-Mart blocked, or vice-versa.'
Secretary of State for Trade and Industry Patricia Hewitt referred the four grocers to the Competition Commission in March.
Philip Green was cleared to bid, but called off a meeting with Safeway last month because of illness.
Safeway has not heard from him since and no new date has been arranged.
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