Grapevine: Proud Playboy Irvine Consoles Scheckter

Eddie Irvine happily pleaded guilty to charges of being a playboy on Thursday and offered a word or two of advice to his disgraced former Jaguar team mate Tomas Scheckter.

Scheckter, the 20-year-old son of South Africa's former world champion Jody, was sacked by the Formula One team last week following a court appearance in Northampton accused of kerb crawling. He apologised to the court and was fined. Irvine, whose party lifestyle has made him a regular in the English tabloid newspapers, suggested jokingly at first that Scheckter had made a geographical mistake.

"I think he should live in Milan, it's a lot cheaper and there's a lot more of a selection as well," he told a news conference ahead of Sunday's Austrian Grand Prix. Then, after the laughter had subsided, he offered some serious words of consolation.

"It's a shame for the boy. I think it's a big penalty to pay for something that...in the 21st century it's quite ridiculous really. But cream always rises to the top and I think the boy is good enough. If you look at his record in the lower formulas he's obviously a talented guy.

"He's going to make it. I think this is a setback but I don't think in the overall picture it (will hurt)."

Scheckter had a testing contract with Jaguar for this season but had been sidelined for the first four races when the team brought in Spaniard Pedro de la Rosa. His dismissal came just as it seemed he would get more time in the car, with de la Rosa moving up to the race team in place off departed Brazilian Luciano Burti.

Irvine faced criticism last week about his lifestyle, with an article in British weekly magazine Autosport stating that "very, very few Jaguar men have a nice word to say about Edmund Irvine".

The Northern Irishman was accused, among other things, of being lazy and of having left a Jerez test early in January and jetting off to Miami to "lounge around in the sun". Irvine replied that he had probably done more testing than McLaren's Mika Hakkinen and David Coulthard together this season. But he was unabashed about his lifestyle.

"Being a playboy. I like girls, I like having a nice life. I am very happy to be guilty of all charges," he said.

The 35-year-old said the newspaper headlines did not affect him.

"I love being in the newspapers, it makes me more famous," he said with a grin.

It was put to Irvine that some of the accusations made against him could only have emanated from within the team, where his outspoken views have not always gone down well. Jaguar have had major changes of personnel, with former champion Niki Lauda coming in to work with team principal Bobby Rahal, and have yet to score a point this season.

"Maybe it is someone within the team but, you know, I know what I am doing within that team," said Irvine, who earlier this month effectively wrote the season off as a test bed for 2002.

"Some people probably don't like it but that's the only way that we are going to get to the top," he added. "They either join us or they don't. And it won't be me that's leaving next year, put it like that."