Richards Wants Long Term Deal for Villeneuve

British American Racing boss David Richards said on Friday that he would like to keep Canadian Jacques Villeneuve at the team for a long time.

"Obviously I'm not going to discuss the commercial relationship but I would like to keep him on the long term," said Richards today in France. "Jacques and I have had discussions about this and I think he's also quite keen to stay on the long term as well. Clearly that will be an ongoing discussion between the two of us."

Richards has suggested in the past that he would like Villeneuve to take a salary cut and, asked how important the different price was, said that was "an ongoing discussion".

Villeneuve criticised Richards back in June after his comments. The 1997 World Champion is reportedly the second highest paid driver behind Ferrari's Michael Schumacher, with an estimated salary of $20 million per year.

However, on Thursday Villeneuve said that unless something "extreme" happened, he would be staying with his current team in 2003.

Who will fill the second seat at the Brackley team, however, is still unknown, and while Richards praised Villeneuve's teammate Olivier Panis, at the same time he refused to predict the Frenchman's future.

"Olivier clearly has done a great job for the team and again he's here at his home event, we are looking for him to do a great job as well," he said. "[But] I wouldn't want to commit myself now to anything definitive."