The FIA rally director, Yves Matton, states that the promoter of Rally Great Britain is working hard to possible return of Rally GB in 2022 calendar after the consecutive cancellations of their event in the last two years.
In 2020, Rally Great Britain was absent from the WRC calendar due to COVID-19 restrictions while Ypres Rally Belgium was the replacement of Rally Great Britain last year despite the fact that eventually the event of Belgium was cancelled.
The promoter of Rally Great Britain, Bobby Willis, tried to bring this event back up to 2021 calendar with Nothern Ireland being the hostage country this time instead of Wales, but this project failed as he was not able to secure the £2 million funding to be held this event.
"Yes they [Northern Ireland promoter] are working hard to try to be part of the calendar", Matton told Motorsport.com.
"I will not anticipate the result.
"I know that it is an ongoing process with the promoter.
"We all for sure want to have a rally in the UK and Great Britain.
"Where is it is not the main issue, for sure we would be happy to go back to Ireland.
"I would like the future if we are able to, have one event each year in Great Britain and go maybe to different regions, this would be for sure in the trend of what we want to do".
Finally, he told about the 2022 calendar of WRC and the possible return of New Zealand to the WRC: "For sure our wish from the promoters and the FIA would be to publish a full calendar in June but I want to thank the promoters for the hard work they have done to be able to publish a bit more than a half calendar in June and to be close to finalise agreements with the other events.
"The difficulty for 2022 is to see when we will able to travel again overseas as countries are closing their doors again and that is why we need bit more time to see what we will be able to do.
"I’m really happy that at least these events [the nine confirmed] are now able to work and anticipate 2022 and I’m very confident that in September we will be able to finalise the full calendar.
"I believe it is bit early to give you an answer not only on New Zealand but this region. It is quite closed there.
"It is a wish to go to New Zealand as it is part of the DNA of championship and honestly I hope it can be back in 2022, but the most important thing is to go there once again as early as possible".
Source: Motorsport.com
Photo Credits: Toyota
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