Depending on where his contract negotiations are at, this weekend’s Wales Rally GB could be Hayden Paddon’s most important WRC round yet.
Last week’s news that Sebastien Ogier has signed with Citroen for the 2019 season has opened the driver market up and ignited the silly season.
As it stands, only five drivers have contracts locked in for next year, and two of those are Paddon’s team-mates at Hyundai – Thierry Neuville and Andreas Mikkleson. The others are Teemu Suninen (M-Sport) and Ott Tanak (Toyota).
It’s been reported that Paddon is close to signing another deal with the Korean manufacturer to share a car with Spaniard Dani Sordo, and while this keeps him in the championship on a part-time basis, it’s hardly the best deal he’d be looking to secure.
Ogier’s seat at M-Sport would be the ideal landing spot for Paddon. It’s a team he’s driven for once before, and with neither of the team’s other two drivers having set the championship on fire this year, the British-based team could be open to further changes.
A top-three finish in GB this weekend would do Paddon’s chances no harm whatsoever.
There are other drivers with a stronger pedigree available though.
Kris Meeke’s very public axing from Citroen this season came as a shock to many, and while he’s been heavily linked to Toyota, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see the Irishman signing for Malcolm Wilson’s squad.
Toyota’s Jari-Matti Latvala and Esapekka Lappi are both uncontracted and will help shape the driver line-ups for next year, and you’d expect both would be chosen ahead of Paddon, based on outright speed alone.
Throw into the mix Craig Breen and Mads Ostberg, and you see that a full-time drive for Paddon is no given. In fact, a shared car with Sordo may well be the best offer the Kiwi has on the table.
Paddon deserves to be in the WRC with a full-time seat, there’s no question about that.
But there’s no certainties in life, as Aussie Chris Atkinson discovered at the end of the 2008 season.
In an under-performing Subaru Impreza World Rally Car, Atkinson had outdriven his World Champion team-mate, Petter Solberg, for much of the season, taking five podium finishes to the Norwegian’s one.
Yet, when Subaru unexpectedly ended their WRC program at the end of the 2008 season, Atkinson was left high and dry and would never land a full-time seat in the WRC again.
We all have our fingers crossed that Hayden Paddon doesn’t find himself in a similar situation, and that his name remains a regular on WRC entry lists, and high on the leaderboard where it belongs.
It’s also hoped that money doesn’t play a part in team’s selecting their drivers for the 2019 season, and that ability and past performances alone dictate who fronts up at Monte Carlo next January.
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