WRC » Stobart team confirms 2009 participation

Glad to see Matthew Wilson has another full season in the WRC, can''t think of anyone more deserving...

i'm struggling to see how wrc is going to look next season with the lack of manufacturers taking part...its starting to look like a duel....

It wont be so bad, Subaru and suzuki had been struggling all year anyway. Now you will see many drivers driving mainly two types of top car: Focus/C4. You will see the top 4 works drivers, plus the like of Andreas Erikson, Henning, Duval, Gali, Clarke, Vilagra, Wilson, poss Wilks, Rautenbach in a C4, Ostberg in an 08 Subaru and maybe Solberg will join him there to make it an all Norweigen affair too. Im sure it wont be as bad as some may think. There are to many cars laying about idle. You may even see three cars in the Adapta team yet. I dont fore see Atkinson driving next year though. I think he will start testing a new S2000 car for prodrive around August/Sept time.

Even though I am gutted that Subaru have gone, I agree with Dafydd: I don't think it will be as bad as people are making out. There is not JUST two teams/four cars, now Stobart are confirmed there will be at least seven or eight cars, plus however many 'extra' Citroen's there are... The DTM has "two teams", and is a really fantastic series, so I really don't think the WRC will struggle that much!

Thankyou Sarah, I think it will be just fine next year, only its looking doubtful if G.B will muscle its way back into the Calender.

Now I'm upset. Christopher the was one of the worst comments i have ever heard.
"can't think of anyone more deserving..." i am disgusted you think that. How about Solberg, Atkinson, Gardemeister, Andersson, Duval, Galli, H Solberg, Wilks, Mikkelsen, Hanninen and the list goes on......
I have realised that poms like Wilson, but no-one else does. And you guys being poms and Wilson being a poms doesn't make him good. A good Englishman (and Irish etc) is Wilks and Meeke.
Stuff it, IRC looks more promising next year, especially with Meeke there.

Wow, Christopher, you probably need to put some sort of emoticon after sarcastic statements, apparently a lot of folks here didn't get the joke.

But seriously, there are a lot of ACTUAL talent that just got dumped onto the driver market, even deserving drivers like Henning, Francois and Gigi will struggle to keep the other Stobart seats, fighting off at least P-G, Toni, Petter, Chris, and probably others whose teams have lost funding. Guess there's no chance of someone from the lower series making it to the big time next year (partly because Matthew's got a guarantee on one of the best seats.)

Yes, a bit of a 'gilt edged' life Wilson junior has led..I remember thinking it was a little dodgy when he was in the Ford advert as a young McRae but to keep a place in a main wrc team for so long, and consistently hold the back of the wrc field ( minus a couple of also ran results ), is 'rather large on nepotism'. IMO

Im tired of telling people this, Matt's seat is "bought and paid for" contributed to by his family just like Rautenbach's seat is subsidised by his family too, I never seem to hear you guys whinge about Rautenbach, or Gardemeister lets say. Matts seat is an additional seat created for "only him". He drives a damn site faster than any of you guys could ever drive, He has strict orders from his Dad to get to the end of Rallies and learn the roads and gain experience - so have some respect !! Also appreciate the work by a driver that is needed to keep a Rally car on the road, its not easy. Matt doesnt crash hardly ever so its coming together. Also he is still shook up from the Japan Accident.

Dafydd Larcombe you said "Matt doesnt crash hardly". It's because he doesn't drive fast enough, hence the pathetic results.