From the Pulpit

On the basis that, if you had to name a single name, Ralf Schumacher has been the single least impressive driver so far this season, with whom should Toyota replace him for 2008 - and beyond?

It's a trickier question even than it at first looks, and even as I write I'm sure it's occupying the deceptively fecund mind of Toyota Motorsport's affable president, John Howett, the Formula 1 team's de facto principal.

For it was at Monaco two weekends ago that the driver market began to stir itself into action for the first time, and a lot of people were having who'll-go-where-in-2008 conversations. A hell of a lot, actually, Howett one of them.

As is so often the case in F1, the most coveted (read: the best) four drivers are contracted to the best two teams.

For the avoidance of doubt, I'm referring, in the approximate order that the other nine teams covet them, to Lewis Hamilton, Fernando Alonso, Felipe Massa and Kimi Raikkonen. Equally, none of the 'big four' will be available until 2009 at the earliest, their contracts dauntingly hard to challenge before that time.

Toyota TF107 of Ralf Schumacher © XPB/LAT

Teams like Toyota - and Renault and BMW and Red Bull and even Honda, if they ever get their act together - will be undoubtedly keen to tempt the 'big four' away from Ferrari and McLaren for 2009 and beyond.

I'd be surprised if men like Howett, Renault's Flavio Briatore, BMW's Mario Theissen, Red Bull's Christian Horner and even Honda's Nick Fry hadn't already begun having the odd surreptitious SMS exchange with men like Anthony Hamilton (Lewis's father), Luis Garcia Abad (Fernando's manager), Nicolas Todt (Felipe's manager) and David or Steve Robertson (Kimi's managers).

And of the four, simply because Massa seems almost umbilically tied to Ferrari (Nicolas Todt is Jean Todt's son, remember) and because Raikkonen is currently confounding most paddock observers with his inability to beat young Felipe, it is doubtless the mobile numbers of Garcia Abad and Hamilton (senior) that are currently the most sought-after.

Rumours of tension at McLaren, first between Ron Dennis and Alonso and then between Dennis and Hamilton, wildly exaggerated though they may have been, will have done nothing to quell the avaricious ambition of rival team principals, anxious to snare the undoubted performance advantage that a Hamilton or an Alonso would undoubtedly bestow.

Bearing in mind that, rightly or wrongly, men like Howett, Briatore, Theissen, Horner and Fry may fancy their chances of offering enough wonga to tempt Hamilton and/or Alonso away from McLaren and into their respective teams for 2009 and beyond - another question then arises: "Whom should I hire for 2008?"

It's a trickier question even than it first looks, for all the reasons outlined above. And there are two schools of thought: either do what Renault and Red Bull will probably do (i.e., retain for one more year the 30-something devils-they-know, namely Giancarlo Fisichella and David Coulthard) or do what Toyota will probably do (i.e., discard, at long last, their overpaid 30-something retainer, who has never justified his enormous salary at any point in the two-and-a-bit years he's been coining it).

What will BMW and Honda do? Dunno. Nick Heidfeld, whose contract expires at the end of this season, is driving well, so he would be hard to jettison; I expect Theissen therefore to continue with his current line-up next year.

But if he does, he'll offer Heidfeld a one-year deal only, the better to be able to poach one of the 'big four' for 2009. Honda? Who knows? Fry's problem is that no-one wants to drive for Honda at the moment - not even Jenson Button and Rubens Barrichello, let alone one of the 'big four'.

And if Toyota do discard Ralf at the end of this season, as they should and doubtless at last will, then with whom - bearing in mind that they'll only want to offer him a one-year deal in order to be able to move fast for one of the 'big four' if Howett's SMS exchanges begin to look promising any time soon - will they replace him?

Ralf Schumacher crashes his Toyota during Monaco practice © XPB/LAT

Toyota have never gone for a youngster before, but I reckon they will do this time. Jarno Trulli, now nearly 33, is doing a good job this year, and is contracted until the end of 2008, so the logical thing to do would be to offer a talented youngster a one-year deal for 2008 only. That way, Toyota will be well placed for whatever happens, 'big four'-wise, for 2009.

As follows: if (a) they manage to hire a 'big four' driver for 2009, then they can either (b) re-sign Trulli to drive alongside him, or (c) re-sign their talented youngster to drive alongside him, if they've been impressed by him and therefore think he's a better long-term prospect than Trulli will by then be.

And (d) if they fail to hire a 'big four' driver for 2009, well, they can simply re-sign both Trulli and their talented youngster, can't they?

Which leaves one big question: which talented youngster should they hire? In effect, it's the same question as the one I asked at the top of this column: with whom should Toyota replace Ralf for 2008?

Nico Rosberg, 21, would be ideal, but somehow I don't see it happening. Nico is contracted to Williams until the end of 2008, but Frank Williams would surely entertain parting with him one year early if the transfer fee were sufficiently chunky; Nico is good, very good, but the fact is that Frank needs money more than he needs Nico.

But I don't think Keke would want his son to go to Toyota just yet. No, I reckon Keke would rather Nico spent 2008 at Williams, refining his craft and polishing what few rough edges still remain, so as to be ready to move to BMW in 2009 - or, perhaps, to Ferrari or McLaren in 2009 if one of the 'big four' should be tempted away by a huge whack of Toyota/Renault/BMW/Red Bull/Honda wonga.

Keke probably figures that Nico can drive for Toyota when he's 30-something (which, lest we forget, is still a decade away); a US$50m-over-three-years deal with Toyota, with options, would be a very nice way for Nico to see out his F1 career.

So which talented youngster, then, could Toyota hire? The answer is Adrian Sutil, 24.

Sutil is German (which, even in a post-Schumi world, is still F1's nationality du jour), good-looking and clean-cut (always a plus), multilingually articulate (ditto), good with sponsors and press (ditto again) and, more important than any of the above, quick.

Adrian Sutil set the fastest time in the wet practice at Monaco © XPB/LAT

Anyone who can put a Spyker, of all cars, at the top of the timing screens in a wet session at Monaco, of all places, as Adrian did on the Saturday morning this year, is undoubtedly quick.

And, although Hamilton won more races when he and Sutil were F3 Euro Series team-mates at ASM in 2005, Adrian was often just as quick as the lad who has this season become F1's most coveted property bar none.

Not surprisingly, Spyker's bigwigs have begun openly to admit that they fear they won't be able to hold on to their young star for long - especially after Monaco.

"He'll be winning Grands Prix on a regular basis for a big team in three or four years' time," said one seen-it-all-before Spyker engineer - and he said that before Monaco, too.

Sutil for Toyota in 2008? It may happen; what's more, it should happen.

Editor's note: autosport.com readers are invited to attend An Evening With Ron Dennis, a black-tie dinner at London's ritzy Hurlingham Club on the evening of Wednesday July 11. Matt Bishop will host the evening, and will interview the McLaren chief on stage.