Motor Sport/ Formula One: Michael Schumacher has predicted that Kimi Raikkonen, his successor with Ferrari, would not lose his world championship title to Lewis Hamilton at this morning's FIA court of appeal hearing in London.

The hearing has been convened to examine alleged fuel irregularities in four cars during last month's Brazilian Grand Prix.

"I would be very surprised if Kimi loses out," said Schumacher yesterday after completing two days of testing for Ferrari at Barcelona's Circuit de Catalunya. "I heard that Max (Mosley, the FIA president) already said even if you disqualify some cars, there's no need to change the classification.

"But I think there's plenty of options after this year - if you start to change again the classification, I think it would be bad for Formula One because it had been finished fair and square on the track and there's no need to carry on looking at it."

Schumacher's long-time rival Damon Hill found himself in rare agreement with the seven-time title winner, believing Hamilton had little chance of being given the title.

"I think it's very, very unlikely that will happen," said Hill, who is now president of the British Racing Drivers' Club. "We know who the 2007 world champion is."

For Hamilton, a belated elevation to the world championship effectively depends on the disqualification of the three cars which crossed the line ahead of his seventh-placed McLaren in the final race of the season.

It would also hinge on the stewards then promoting Hamilton to fourth, rather than annulling the points for the disqualified cars and not promoting any cars classified behind them.

McLaren have made it clear they believe it would be bad for Formula One if the appeal court were to give Hamilton the drivers' world championship on a technicality. That view was expressed again yesterday by Martin Whitmarsh, the McLaren chief executive.

"Finding a way to award the drivers' championship to Lewis retrospectively is not at all, however, what this is about," he added.

"Victory for us would be a clarification of the rationale behind the FIA stewards' decision at the 2007 Brazilian Grand Prix - a clarification, indeed, that we regard as essential not only for us but for all our competitors, to enable all teams to race in compliance with the regulation regarding fuel temperatures throughout the 2008 Formula One season."

The controversy started when the stewards failed to apply penalties against Nico Rosberg of Williams and BMW Saubers' Robert Kubica and Nick Heidfeld, who finished fourth, fifth and sixth at Interlagos.

The stewards had earlier received a report from the FIA technical delegate which indicated that the temperature of the fuel pumped into those three cars, plus the other Williams of Kazuki Nakajima, was more than 10 degrees below ambient temperature.

This seemed a clear infringement of the rule which states that "no fuel on board the car may be more than 10 degrees below ambient temperature".

After examining the issues involved, the stewards said they had available to them the temperature of fuel in the fuel rig itself, the ambient temperature taken from the timing monitors provided by Formula One management and that taken from Meteo France, the FIA- and team-contracted meteorologists. Given a discrepancy in the ambient temperatures recorded by the latter two sources, they felt there was sufficient doubt to make the application of a penalty inappropriate.

Schumacher completed his second day of testing at Barcelona by again setting the fastest lap, this time 0.4 seconds quicker than the McLaren-Mercedes driven by Pedro de la Rosa, the test driver who is on the list of candidates under consideration to replace Fernando Alonso as Hamilton's team-mate in 2008.

• Guardian Service