Jaguar denies Wurz for Pizzonia move.

Jaguar Racing has strongly refuted speculation that it is about to replace struggling rookie Antonio Pizzonia with experienced McLaren test driver Alex Wurz.

Although sources within the team have hinted that Pizzonia - a signing made by long-departed team boss Niki Lauda for 2003 - could be replaced as early as round six of the world championship, official spokesman Nav Sidhu has played down the rumours, claiming that the Brazilian needs to be given time to adjust to Formula One.

"We have not taken a decision to drop Antonio Pizzonia and, on the contrary, we are working very closely with him today at a test in Mugello," Sidhu told the Reuters news agency, "It's clear that he hasn't had the best start to his season but, nonetheless, we are committed towards addressing this and helping Antonio."

Pizzonia, known as 'Jungle Boy' in the paddock because of his Amazonian origins, was seen by many as a surprise choice to partner Mark Webber at Jaguar this season, having struggled to shine in F3000 after excelling in the lower formulae. Lauda hired the former British F3 champion largely on the strength of his testing performances with F1 rivals WilliamsF1 - and also on sporadic 'guest' outings in the lacklustre 2002-spec R3 - but is not around to see exactly how his charge is fairing now that the new season has started.

Although he is the only Jaguar driver to officially bring the new, improved R4 to the finish - albeit two laps down at last weekend's San Marino GP - Pizzonia has suffered more than his fair share of incidents as he tries to keep up with hotshot team-mate Mark Webber. Jaguar, however, is keen to give him another chance at next weekend's Spanish GP, which is run at a circuit the Brazilian knows extremely well after completing 15,500km of testing there in 2002 alone.

Should he fail to impress sufficiently, the rumour mill insists that Pizzonia will be axed - in much the same way as another promising youngster, Luciano Burti, was in 2001 - and replaced by Wurz. The tall McLaren test driver is currently contracted as the Woking team's reserve pilot, but would undoubtedly jump at the chance to get back into a full-time racing situation - particularly one beginning, as it would for round six, at his home A1-Ring.