When Richard Zannino, Dow Jones chief executive, arrived at News Corp’s dining room on March 29, for a private breakfast with Rupert Murdoch, he must have had at least an inkling of what would be on the menu.

It was no secret that Mr Murdoch had long yearned to bring Dow Jones and its Wall Street Journal into his media empire: Jim Cramer, the hedge fund manager and columnist, says the News Corp chief executive called him back in 1996 to pick his brains about what it would take to pry the company away from the Bancroft family, which has controlled it since 1902.