Kawasaki has ruled John Hopkins out of the next two MotoGP rounds at Germany’s Sachsenring and Laguna Seca opening the door for Britain’s Chaz Davies to step in at the American race.
Hopkins faces surgery on the tibia he broke during a crash at Assen and his team have confirmed he also needs some work on a compression injury on his knee, ruling him out of his home race.
Marco Melandri is rumoured to have asked to be set free from his Ducati contract to join Kawasaki but the likelihood of that is, erm, nil.
So that leaves Kawasaki boss Michael Bartholemy a bike with no rider. The obvious choice would be AMA rider Roger Lee Hayden, but he is still recovering from injury, so current AttacK Kawasaki man Davies is next in line. But he could be fighting off British born rider Jamie Hacking too.