by Rob Wilkins


BP Ford team director Malcolm Wilson is 'confident' that Mikko Hirvonen will be able to step up this year and assume the role of team leader.

Hirvonen, who will take over the #1 seat following Marcus Gronholm's decision to retire, won three events last season, en-route to securing third spot in the drivers' championship - 17 points behind Sebastien Loeb, who took the title for the fourth year in succession.

"I feel very confident [that we can continue to run at the front in '08]," Wilson Sr told Crash.net Radio recently. "Mikko continued to do an incredible job for the team in 2007 in backing up Marcus on many occasions.

"He was there again to win in Japan when Marcus went off the road and again he was there in Ireland just to continue around and make sure that he got us the necessary points to clinch our second manufacturers' championship.

"He won three rallies in 2007 and I am sure he can win more than that in 2008. It is going to be very difficult to replace Marcus but I am confident Mikko can step up and step up to do the job very, very well."

Asked about the Focus RS WRC car and the developments planned for the coming year, Wilson revealed that the M-Sport-run squad will probably debut another evolution in the summer.

"Yeah you will [see a development of the Focus RS WRC 2007 in '08]," he added. "We are non-stop developing all of the time though and at what point in the year we will make that evolution I don't know at this moment in time. But it will probably be around the middle of the year again, like we did in 2007 in Finland, which worked very, very well.

"Since we have introduced the '07 version we haven't actually been beaten on gravel. It was obviously a step forward - and even though it is very difficult now with the way the regulations are to keep making improvements, I am sure [technical director] Christian [Loriaux] and his team will be pushing very hard and will come up with something that is going to give us an improvement for the second half of 2008."