Lewis has dreams and being mid-field is not one of them...step it up a gear or lose him, Mercedes

At the season-opener in Bahrain

- ANDY DUNN

SIR LEWIS HAMILTON could not have been more emphatic about an impending new contract, which will extend his £40million-a-year stay with Mercedes beyond 2023.

It WILL be done, the seven-time world champion has been saying time and time again over the past three days in Bahrain.

I'm here this year and I'll be here next year, he repeats.

It's a great team, I've had brilliant times with them and Toto Wolff is great, he never tires of declaring.

And Hamilton has always been as honest a sportsman as you could wish to deal with.

But up and down the paddock here in Sakhir, there are knowing looks looks that suggest, "Well, he has to say that, doesn't he?".