Following Prodrive's low-key announcement that it is not in a position to contest the 2008 Formula One World Championship, having secured the coveted twelfth entry, FIA President Max Mosley has warned that he cannot guarantee the British team an entry in 2009.

"There's nothing to stop them entering for 2009," Mosley told The Paddock. "At the request of his financial backers, David Richards asked me what guarantee could we give that his entry would be accepted in 2009. I had to tell him that he didn't have any guarantee.

"In the normal course of events, Prodrive's entry would be accepted," he added, "but the situation without the Concorde Agreement is as it was before the Concorde Agreement, people submit entries and the FIA accepts or rejects them."

Mosley revealed that the British team had paid a £217,000 (300,000 Euros) deposit on its 2008 entry, which it will probably now forfeit.

Prodrive, which had planned to use a McLaren-Mercedes package, announced its decision to give the 2008 season a miss late last month, following a string of cancelled deadlines when the team was scheduled to make public its exact plans. Announcing the decision not to enter F1 next season, the team cited the failure of the FIA, FOM and the teams to agree a new Concorde Agreement, together with the prospect of a legal challenge regarding the whole issue of customer cars.

Recently, F1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone argued against customer cars, long championed by Mosley. However, following the threat of a legal challenge from Williams, which argues that it is unfair that a team (such as Prodrive) can purchase an off-the-shelf package when other teams are spending countless millions on research and development as they get their cars to the grid, Mosley appears to understand the Grove outfit's stance.

"There's a huge discussion going on about what it is to be a 'constructor'," he said. "The first item for discussion should be chassis regulations that can offer serious cost savings. Once we've done that, we can decide what can distinguish one chassis from another and how much of the car should be unique to each individual team."