It is a formal meeting of minds also tipped to be a battle of influence and ego between two of Australian sport's most powerful men.

John Coates and John Wylie – the national Olympic committee and sports commission chiefs at odds in backroom politics and recent verbal slanging matches - are to dissect the Australian Institute of Sport together.

The imminent union of the two heavyweights on a nine-member advisory panel is yet to be announced officially but already has tongues wagging in senior ranks of elite sport.

Fairfax Media can reveal Australian Sports Commission boss Wylie, is to chair an "AIS Future Directions" advisory panel that will analyse – and add to - a full-scale review of the AIS by The Boston Consulting Group.

Coates has already described what he has seen of the AIS review findings as "superficial" and "lacking concrete proposals", amid other scorching criticism of the ASC and AIS from the Olympic committee.

Along with Coates, the advisory panel is set to feature legendary national hockey coach Ric Charlesworth, recently retired basketball champion Lauren Jackson, Football Federation of Australia boss David Gallop, Victorian Institute of sport head Anne Marie Harrison and Australian netball's Diamonds coach Lisa Alexander.

While there is scarcely a wallflower among the nine panellists, the dynamic between Coates and Wylie will intrigue after the AOC president labelled Wylie's ASC a "bloated bureaucracy" in February.

In a tirade of criticism vented in the countdown to the Rio Olympics, the AOC also likened the ASC-funded, Canberra headquartered, AIS to an outdated ghost town.

In the inflammatory public commentary AOC bosses characterised the AIS headquarters as a once-humming hub for elite athletes now used more by bureaucrats wanting to keep fit around office hours.

The stinging public AOC assessments - viewed as untimely and possibly distracting by some national chiefs of sport - pre-empted findings of The Boston Consulting Group review the ASC had already commissioned.

The AOC then moved to independently survey national sport chiefs on the efficacy of the AIS; also a contentious exercise with some telling Fairfax anonymously that they disapproved of Coates' timing.

The Boston review was commissioned to advise the best way forward for elite Australian sport through the AIS under the "Australia's Winning Edge" blueprint implemented after the nation's 2012 Olympics dip.

The purpose of the separate nine-person advisory panel led by Wylie is to thrash out the Boston review findings and add suggestions from diverse experts with first-hand experiences of the AIS and its programs.

The advisory group is described in planning correspondence as providing a "fresh but also experienced set of eyes" on the AIS review and is invited to "contribute constructively".

Recommendations will eventually be put to the ASC board for action.

The advisory group members have been approached but are yet to assemble despite an initial plan for the first of several "workshop style discussions" between April and December this year.

It's anticipated the first meeting will now happen in June.

Next January has been set as the target date for implementing potentially major changes from the work.

The panel is being asked to critique every aspect of the AIS, ranging from what it offers as a research, high-performance training, medical and sport agency to its deficiencies.

Fairfax understands the panel has been asked to examine four key areas including the best use of the Canberra AIS campus in future.

The fundamental strategic purpose of the AIS in Australia's high-performance system, the most effective role for the AIS in leading and coordinating the nation's high-performance programs, and areas the AIS should target to lift Australia's high-performance results are the other themes set out for the advisory group to debate.

The group will be asked to suggest how the AIS can be measured against other models internationally.

Since opening in 1981 the AIS has existed to identify, support, groom and improve the country's best athletes.

The ASC had embarked on a review of the institute and associated programs before the AOC's public pasting, intent on re-configuring and improving the AIS before the 2020 Olympic and Paralympic cycles.