GETTY Paul Di Resta was Williams' reserve driver last year but could be replaced

Di Resta was Williams’ test driver in 2017 and took part in the Hungarian Grand Prix when Felipe Massa was ruled out through illness. The Scot was a front-runner for the seat when the Brazilian retired at the end of last year but Williams also handed testing opportunities to Sergey Sirotkin and Robert Kubica in a post-season tyre test in Abu Dhabi. But Di Resta reckons that his speed alone was not enough to secure the seat, which Express Sport understands is to be given to Sirotkin later this month. “I don’t think it’s any secret I’m not going to be doing it,” Di Resta told Express Sport.

GETTY Paul Di Resta took part in the Formula E rookie test last weeked with Jaguar

"I’m not in the plans at the moment. What else they do I don’t know. They’ve got a few other guys in the equation. “Sirotkin, Daniil Kvyat [recently announced as Ferrari development driver] is out of it, Pascal [Wehrlein] was maybe cruising around: I don’t know which direction they’re going to go. “Absolutely [I wanted that seat] and I was only told very very late December that I wasn’t in contention any more. I had a couple of good years there, I would obviously have wanted to do that more. “I had a very good test when they did the ‘driver assessment’ if you want to call it. “I was very happy with how that came out. “But for whatever reason… there are various other things that go [into getting] that seat.” When approached about Di Resta's comments, Williams told Express Sport that they would not be saying anything until after their driver announcement.

Di Resta will return to Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters, better known as DTM, for his ninth season in the series in 2018. But the 31-year-old’s team Mercedes will be pulling out of the sport at the end of the year, leaving Di Resta without a full-time drive. And with a return to F1, where he has previously raced for Williams and Force India, apparently off the cards, he is considering other options. He was in Marrakesh this weekend for the ABB FIA Formula E rookie test, where he spent time on track for the Jaguar team alongside fellow first-timer Pietro Fittipaldi. The electric series has already attracted a number of former F1 drivers and the Brit is keen on potentially following that same route.

F1 2018 driver line-up Tue, January 16, 2018 Express Sport brings you the full F1 2018 driver line-up Play slideshow Getty Images 1 of 10 Mercedes – Lewis Hamilton (44) and Valtteri Bottas (77)