MotoMatters.com | Kropotkin Thinks

For the past couple of weeks, the MotoGP paddock has been on tenterhooks waiting for an announcement on the future of Alex de Angelis. The Italian has been working on a deal to keep the Scot Honda team in MotoGP, with backing from De Angelis' native mountain republic of San Marino. An announcement was expected this weekend at Sepang, but it failed to come, raising fears that the deal had fallen through.

That seems to be confirmed by an interview which the French motorcycling website Moto Caradisiac did with Monster Tech 3 Yamaha team boss Herve Poncharal. The Frenchman was ostensibly talking about Tech 3's new Moto2 project, which they hope to present at the final Valencia round of MotoGP, and mentioned the riders in line for a ride with the team. "I have five possible candidates," Poncharal told Moto Caradisiac. "Alex de Angelis, who told me yesterday that MotoGP is gone for him, and the Scot Honda project with San Marino won't happen; [current Scot Honda 250 rider Raffaele] de Rosa, [current Pramac Ducati rider Niccolo] Canepa, [former Scot Honda rider Yuki] Takahashi and [current Matteoni 250 rider] Jules Cluzel."

No announcement on the status of the project has been forthcoming from either Scot Honda, HRC or San Marino, which would seem to suggest that Poncharal is correct and Scot Honda's bid to stay in MotoGP has foundered on a lack of funds. This paves the way for the possibility of Lucio Cecchinello's LCR Honda team to get a second machine, and bring the number of Honda RC212V's on the grid to 7.