Minardi Confident of Improved Package

The European Minardi team, so often considered the perennial strugglers in the Formula One field, are confident they will shock a few people with their improvements next season.

The team showed signs of progress towards the end of the year, through young drivers Fernando Alonso and Alex Yoong, but still failed to score a Championship point.

However, the Anglo-Italian outfit are confident they will have a commercial package to rival, or even better, some teams and that will aid the surge through the field on the track.

"I think we will be a lot better placed than several other teams," said a Minardi spokesperson. "Things will come clearer when we do the launch, but we have a fairly strong commercial package for next season."

The Minardi spokesman added that the team do not have a set date to launch their new package yet, but are most likely to do it just before the start of next season.

"We haven't got a specific launch date yet, but if we do what Paul (Stoddart) wants to do, and that is test in January, then we will have some sort of roll-out at a circuit in Europe," he added.

"But I expect the full launch will be most likely to be in Kuala Lumpur, or possibly Melbourne the week before the Grand Prix."