{"id":18998,"date":"2013-08-15T07:23:53","date_gmt":"2013-08-15T11:23:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/?p=18998"},"modified":"2013-08-15T07:23:53","modified_gmt":"2013-08-15T11:23:53","slug":"ferrari-plays-down-raikkonen-return-reports","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/formula-1\/ferrari-plays-down-raikkonen-return-reports\/","title":{"rendered":"Ferrari plays down Raikkonen return reports"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Ferrari has repeated its denial, as reports Kimi Raikkonen could return to the Italian team in 2014 persist.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"ngg-singlepic ngg-left alignleft\" style=\"border: 1px solid black; margin: 5px 10px;\" alt=\"Ferrari\" src=\"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/gallery\/f1-2012-rif-images\/f1-12-logos\/Ferrari.jpg\" width=\"288\" height=\"115\" \/>Two weeks ago, when the Raikkonen rumours first emerged, a Ferrari spokesman insisted the Maranello outfit &#8220;has no interest in the driver market right now&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Now, the Finnish newspaper Ilta-Sanomat claims the 2007 world champion has decided to accept Ferrari&#8217;s offer.<\/p>\n<p>And Ferrari has issued a near-identical denial.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Right now,&#8221; the spokesman told the BBC, &#8220;we&#8217;re really not giving any thought to the driver market situation.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Interestingly, however, Ferrari seemed to rule out the reported scenario that, if Raikkonen does arrive, it could be to replace the Red Bull-bound Fernando Alonso.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Drivers are not a problem for us,&#8221; said the spokesman, &#8220;even if we were to change Felipe (Massa).&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Germany&#8217;s Auto Motor und Sport points out that Raikkonen&#8217;s management could see the Ferrari rumour as mere leverage amid the more realistic talks about 2014 with Lotus and Red Bull.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It is important for Raikkonen to keep a third option open,&#8221; said correspondent Michael Schmidt.<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #888888;\"><em>\u00a9 RIF | GMM<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Ferrari has repeated its denial, as reports Kimi Raikkonen could return to the Italian team in 2014 persist. Two weeks ago, when the Raikkonen rumours first emerged, a Ferrari spokesman insisted the Maranello outfit &#8220;has no interest in the driver market right now&#8221;. Now, the Finnish newspaper Ilta-Sanomat claims the 2007 world champion has decided &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0},"categories":[3],"tags":[5262,130,149,93,5340,152],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18998"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18998"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18998\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18999,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18998\/revisions\/18999"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}