Friday October 18th, 2002

By Will Gray

Eddie Jordan has not yet secured a full budget to enable his team to compete in Formula One next year, as three of the team's current sponsors have still not renewed their deals for 2003.

Jordan's major backers - Benson and Hedges, Deutsche Post and DHL - are still in discussions with the team over the level of their future backing. At the same time, Japanese company Brother announced two days ago their continued support for the team, in the presence of Takuma Sato. On the other hand, Mastercard ended their five-year association last week.

Nevertheless, Jordan sponsorship manager Mark Gallagher is confident that the deals yet to be negotiated will be landed before it is too late, and he insisted that the situation is not unusual.

"I don't think that we have ever had our budget finalised at the last race," he said. "But I am sure the prudently managed teams are in a position to run within the budget and I believe Jordan is one of those."

Eddie Jordan slammed rival team boss Paul Stoddart earlier in the season when the Australian claimed that Jordan's team was in similar trouble to his Anglo-Italian Minardi outfit.

He looked relieved when Japan's Takuma Sato scored two points in his home Grand Prix last Sunday to move his team up to sixth in the Constructors' Championship and net them around £2 million (UK pounds) in extra television revenue.

And Gallagher insisted on Friday that the Silverstone-based outfit is not in danger of going out of business because they spotted potential problems earlier this year.

"We saw the difficulties the sponsors had at the start of the year and made staff cuts earlier in the season," he said. "We are keeping our heads above water and we are going to make a profit this year."

Published at 18:05:56 GMT