14/09/2004
NEWS STORY
Following reports that Renault is considering dropping Jarno Trulli and recruiting 1997 world champion Jacques Villeneuve, the media, and in particular on-line journals, have been giving (almost) hourly updates, with few proving accurate or even credible.
It has been reported that the French Canadian is having a seat fitting at Enstone and could be in the R24 as early as this afternoon.
A number of calls to various people at Enstone indicate that Villeneuve is not at the factory, nor is he expected.
Furthermore, although there is clearly an issue between the French outfit and Trulli, the fact that he is not testing at Silverstone this week is not significant, he was not scheduled to take part, indeed at one crucial test earlier in the season, only Franck Montagny was on duty.
No doubt Villeneuve's many thousands of fans want to see their hero back in a car as soon as possible, albeit it as stand-in for three races.
However, rather than build up their hopes, and then cruelly dash them - as has happened elsewhere so many times already this year - Pitpass prefers to wait until it has the facts, the truth.
And everything we hear from Renault indicates that Villeneuve will not be replacing Trulli.