SUNRED hopes to keep Tarquini, Monteiro

The team now represents SEAT on a non-works basis in the WTCC after the factory operation was canned at the end of 2009.

It fielded Tarquini, Tom Coronel, Monteiro and Jordi Gene, plus rookies Michel Nykjaer and Fredy Barth last year, and has already re-signed the latter pair and recruited SEAT Eurocup graduates Pepe Oriola and Aleksei Dudukalo for 2011.

But although Tarquini and Monteiro tested with the team at Catalunya this week, they have yet to secure new deals. Tarquini told AUTOSPORT last year that he was not sure he wanted to stay on for another season without factory resources.

Team boss Joan Orus confirmed that a six-car line-up was planned again and hopes Tarquini and Monteiro can complete it.

"We will run six cars again," he said. "It will be interesting, with two young drivers like Oriola and Aleksei Dudukalo, two former rookies like Fredy Barth and Michel Nykjaer and - hopefully - two experienced guys like Tarquini and Monteiro."

The team has already said it will not have the new 1.6-litre turbo engine ready for the start of the championship so will begin with the old-style turbodiesels.

Orus suggested that the arrival of the new engines might be staggered, rather than all six cars switching power units at once.

"We will start the season with the turbodiesel cars, but we are working to develop a 1.6-litre turbo engine and we will start using it as soon as possible - at least on some of our six cars," he said.