It may have something to do with UK / European marketing too. These guys are here to sell cars. Sure, he's a rally winner, he probably came fairly cheap too, but he's also very marketable.
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Also being reported on BBC website about Meeke to Toyota
I'm going to hope its not the truth and wait for official confirmation for Toyota lineup.
As I predicted after the rally forum attended by Breen and M.Wilson.
Breen's family does have some money which helped him get into the sport following his father. Maybe this plus a sponsor to pay his wages (RB?) could get him into a drive...
Maybe the same as Evans... he gets a wage from his dad's Ford dealership plus RB sponsorship.
If Ford stay and MW doesnt need to pay big Ogier wages then M-Sport could still stay in the WRC.
Surely Red Bull are gone. If I were Malcolm I think I'd have tried to roll out some excellent hospitality for Spain and in connection with Block being there, tried to entice the likes of Monster Energy, Sonax or even Ford Performance (USA) to attend and get onboard with the WRC... They'd be a perfect partner for a 'youth' team of Sunninen, Breen, Evans/Tiedemans and occasional Block! Easier said than done though I suppose.
As for Meeke, it doesn't really surprise me that he fits into the picture at Toyota. More so than with Hyundai or Citroen, Toyota in the WRC seems to be much more of a passion project for the organisation, particularly pushed by Akio Toyoda. The whole "Gazoo" thing, backing Tommi in the first place with his 'village team' project over TMG. To me Meeke's character fits perfectly here. Plus, he's getting on a bit. This could be a one year deal, a nice final dance for Meeke, leaving the door open nicely for Kalle to come in 2020...
The latter seems to be pretty big IF at the moment. I don't know what the financial input from Ford has been during the past few years when they haven't been in WRC as an official works team, but probably they've covered some of the expenses anyway. If that is about to change, and I don't want to sound disrespectful by any means, but I'm not sure if any wage from any Ford dealership or any money from Breen family is enough to compensate that. If Ford is out, together with RB as a title sponsor, I'd guess we're talking about money around the magnitude of 10M€+ which might be too much to overcome for these fellas. That would probably require some of that Abu Dhabi money...
Great news; for Meeke, for the WRC and for Toyota. Without the pressure of being a leading driver or a car developer, Meeke can focus only on his driving and hopefully he’ll manage to deliver some good results.
Don’t be stupid. Meeke owes a large part of his career to Peugeot/Citroen and despite the troubled times what matters now is to have Citroen and Meeke doing well again in the WRC. Fingers crossed for both.
Come on…Clark was just guessing, like many other journos are most of the time (this said, I really hope Evans is right on this Meeke scoop).
who have been Meekes teammates so far? Sordo, Ostberg and Breen come to my mind.
Hoe did he do against Sordo on Mini days?