Romain Grosjean inadvertently confirms he is staying at Lotus for 2015!

Romain Grosjean has appeared to have inadvertently confirmed he will be staying at Lotus next season.

An announcement that the Frenchman is remaining at Enstone team for a fourth straight campaign has been expected for several weeks and on Wednesday afternoon Grosjean duly tweeted the news from his personal account.

However, the Frenchman appears to have jumped the gun with the tweet and accompanying message – “Proud to announce I’ll be racing with@Lotus_F1Team in #2015” – as it was promptly then deleted from his account.

Official news from Lotus of Grosjean's new deal is therefore likely to be imminent.

Grosjean had at one time been linked with moves from McLaren and Ferrari earlier in the long-running 2015 'silly season' and confirmed earlier this month that performance clauses in his existing deal meant he could leave underperforming Lotus if he wanted at the end of the season.

However, with the available top seats set to be taken up by other drivers, Grosjean was always thought most likely to stay at Lotus, a team which should perform considerably better in 2015 courtesy of a switch from Renault to the class-leading Mercedes engines.

Lotus have previously confirmed that Pastor Maldonado is staying on for 2015.

How the 2015 grid is shaping up:

MERCEDES
Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg

RED BULL
Daniel Ricciardo and Daniil Kvyat

FERRARI
TBC

WILLIAMS
Valtteri Bottas and Felipe Massa

McLAREN
TBC

FORCE INDIA
Nico Hulkenberg and TBC

TORO ROSSO
Max Verstappen and TBC

LOTUS
Pastor Maldonado and TBC

SAUBER
Marcus Ericsson and Felipe Nasr

MARUSSIA (ENTERED AS MANOR F1 TEAM)
TBC

CATERHAM
TBC