New McLaren won't be ready until autumn.

Mercedes-Benz motorsport director Norbert Haug has confirmed what many insiders have been thinking for weeks - that the new McLaren MP4-18 won't be race-ready until at least the Italian Grand Prix.

According to then BBC Online website, Haug said that the long-awaited MP4-18 would not appear at 'any of the next three races', but the site quotes another Mercedes source as saying that Monza may also be in doubt, even though Alex Wurz ended a week of problems by setting the fastest time on the final day of testing last Friday.

"The team will decide the next course of action after reviewing the results of last week's test," the spokesman said.

Although the car has yet to pass the impact tests demanded by the FIA, and has proved to be consistently unreliable on track, Haug insists that it will race at some point this season, before being uprated for 2004.

"Building this completely new car is a complex task," Haug told BBC Online, "The chances of the car being introduced this year are good and the MP4-18 represents in any event a perfect basis for next year's car - it doesn't matter at all whether it's called MP4-18 or 19."

Haug echoed the belief at McLaren that the current MP4-17D would continue to be a threat for the world championship, and that Kimi Raikkonen would be able to keep up the pressure on Michael Schumacher.

"The old car has the potential to win races," he said.