Motor Racing: Ferrari Delay Driver Decisions

Jean Todt, Ferrari's sporting director, has dismissed as uninformed the suggestions from Bernie Ecclestone, formula one commercial rights holder, that Michael Schumacher will announce his retirement at the end of the season.

Todt was speaking in Istanbul against a backdrop of increasing speculation that Schumacher, believed to be on the verge of retirement, had postponed his decision. There may be no definitive announcement as to the Italian team's 2007 driver line-up - as originally promised - over the Italian grand prix weekend at corr Monza next month.

The man who has run the Ferrari team since 1994, insisted that "Bernie does not have any idea whether Michael will be driving in the future or not" after Schumacher finished third behind his team-mate Felipe Massa and Fernando Alonso's Renault in Sunday's Turkish grand prix.

Sources close to Ferrari are hinting that the team will announce that Kimi Raikkonen, Schumacher and Felipe Massa have all been contracted for next season but their precise status will be defined later.

Such a move would give Schumacher another few months of decision time, perhaps deferring his final judgment until he sees whether he has defeated Alonso to claim his eighth world championship title.

Many observers who were until recently confident that Schumacher would stay driving for at least another year in order to confront Raikkonen in equal cars now feel the 37-year old German is looking slightly under pressure and prone to an increasing unforced errors.

While there is uncertainty over Schumacher's future, Flavio Briatore has said he will stay on as Renault team principal next year when the emerging Finnish star Heikki Kovalainen will partner Giancarlo Fisichella in the driver line-up.