Ahead of this weekend's Japanese Grand Prix, World Championship runner-up, Kimi Raikkonen, has played down talk of a move to Ferrari in 2007, and denies that a deal has already been done.

"They're not new rumours, they are already three years old," he said of the ongoing speculation.

"Of course, now, everyone knows that my contract is only to next year with McLaren so maybe it becomes more exciting to write those rumours," he continued, "but the fact is that I have a contract next year and I'm happy with the team and for sure the car will also be good next year and I don't see any reason to go anywhere else.

"After next year, we will see again," he added, "but I'm happy to stay."

Despite some tremendous performances this season, the Finn has finished runner up to the champion for the second time in three seasons, asked which 'loss' was the most painful, he replied: "I think the first one, it was more close so it was more painful.

"We saw quite a long time ago that it would be very difficult to catch them," he added. "We saw that they are very reliable and even though we kept winning they kept finishing behind us so unfortunately it wasn't such a big thing though, but of course we would rather win it than lose it."

Although the McLaren driver missed out on the 2003 title by just two points, he won just one race to Michael Schumacher's six race wins.