Thursday 4 February at 08:31 : Feb.4 (GMM) Christian Horner has added his voice to claims Michael Schumacher will be the 'number one' driver at Mercedes in 2010.

In the pages of the Germany weekly Sport Bild, the Red Bull team boss was responding to reports that Nico Rosberg could find himself playing a subordinate role to the famous seven time world champion.

"Michael was always number one, so in that context it's interesting to observe the little things that indicate a continuation of the tradition," Briton Horner said.

"For example, the sudden change of their starting numbers," he added, referring to Rosberg's loss of the lower number 3 due to Schumacher's superstition.

Horner believes Rosberg, who expected to share a garage with Jenson Button in 2010, became Schumacher's teammate unwittingly.

"If you ask me, when Nico signed his contract with Mercedes, the very last person he would have expected to be his teammate was Michael Schumacher," he said.

Mercedes' Norbert Haug played down the circulating claims about Schumacher's preferential team status.

"This is the usual theatre of formula one," the German told Bild newspaper. "We all laugh about it, and Nico in particular."