By Jamie Makin
August 27 2004

Last week Peter Sauber admitted that the team was in no hurry to name a replacement for Giancarlo Fisichella and they were still debating whether to go for a promising young driver versus an experienced veteran. Jacques Villeneuve's visit to the team's Hinwil headquarters last Tuesday seemed to indicate that Sauber was leaning towards an experienced teammate for the young Felipe Massa who will be staying for the 2005 season.

But today Peter Sauber put that notion to rest when he told The Sun newspaper in Britain that, "we are after a young, wild driver rather than experienced racer". Not only does this decision put the 1997 World Champion out of the picture, but also McLaren's David Coulthard who had also been linked with the Sauber drive.

This shifts the spotlight to three promising candidates; BAR-Honda test driver Anthony Davidson, Mercedes DTM star Gary Paffett and F3000's Vitantonio Liuzzi who has the backing of sponsor Red Bull. Sauber offered praise for two of those drivers. "Anthony has shown he is very quick and Gary is doing a very good job in DTM," he told The Sun. He made no mention of Liuzzi who looks set to claim his first F3000 championship this year.

One man whose name has been suprisingly missing from Sauber's driver search is Nick Heidfeld. The German is currently racing with Jordan this season after having spent the prior three years at the Swiss team. His experience level is borderline between youth and experience but just a few years ago he was being billed as one of the sport's rising stars. Heidfeld's manager Werner Heinz reportedly approached Sauber about a return when it was clear they had a vacant seat but was turned away. Sauber seemed genuinely remorseful about letting Heidfeld go after last season making it all that much more surprising that he would not consider bringing him back.

Sauber has not indicated when they will announce their driver lineup but it is conceivable that they could stage a testing shoot-out between their top choices at the end of the season.

---