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Japanese manufacturers could be put off from taking part in the World Rally Championship after Rally Japan was dropped from next year’s calendar, according to the event's clerk of the course Dimar Krivtsov.

The Hokkaido-based event has been overlooked by the sport's promoter North One Sport.

And Krivtsov is quoted on Autosport.com as saying: "Granted, there is no Japanese manufacturer in the sport anymore – that is true, but I would have thought having Japan in the calendar would help to bring them back.

"The only idea of them being in the championship was the opportunity to showcase themselves in Japan – with that missing I really don't know what the manufacturers would think about coming back."

North One Sport's Simon Long added: "We have lost Japanese manufacturers Subaru, Suzuki and Mitsubishi from the championship and, in the context of manufacturers, there's, perhaps, not the compelling case for putting Japan in the calendar there once was.

"But the door is always very much open here and we will be talking to the organisers in the future."