Francois Duval tipped for Germany return

Despite announcing his retirement earlier this season, it seems the appeal of Rally Deutschland is just too much for Francois Duval.

The Belgian has contacted M-Sport to enquire about the availability of a Focus for next month’s Trier-based event (August 19-22).

Duval has competed on the German round of the World Rally Championship seven times and finished second on three occasions. His last outing on the event, in 2008, was with the Stobart VK M-Sport team when he finished fourth.

Having started his rally career in Belgium, Duval is used to rallying on asphalt with ever-changing surfaces and grip levels, which made him a natural for Rally Deutschland. Despite not rallying at the highest level for more than a year, Duval has kept his competitive eye in competing in rallycross events.

Ford’s technical director Christian Loriaux admitted a commercial deal with Duval would be interesting.

“Francois has had good results in Germany in the past,” said Loriaux. “He’s a very good driver, particularly on this type of event and if he can find the budget - and we have a car available - then it would be good to see him driving a Focus on that event, but this would be a completely commercial deal. We haven’t gone to see Francois to ask him to drive our car, he came to us. But, like I said, he is talented and fast and it would be interesting. Let’s see what happens.”

Given Henning Solberg’s switch to a Fiesta S2000 for the remaining asphalt rounds of the series, it’s possible that - if Duval can source the budget to hire a Focus - he could be slotted back into the Stobart squad as a potential point-scorer alongside regular driver Matthew Wilson for the German event.