Bernie Ecclestone has called on Ferrari to give stronger backing to its team boss Maurizio Arrivabene.
The fabled Italian team has struggled to live up to expectations this season and even fallen behind Red Bull after being touted as possible Mercedes beaters at the start of the year.
A winless season has increased the pressure on Arrivabene and their supposed lead driver Sebastian Vettel with cracks starting to show in recent races.
However, Ecclestone is confident Ferrari can turn the corner in 2017 telling the official F1 website he thinks we will see a “different” Scuderia next year.
Indeed, the long-time CEO believes Maranello needs to look at one of their main rivals for guidance.
“What Maurizio desperately needs is a good backup support like Mercedes have got, for example,” he said. “If he had the support that Mercedes has, they would win races – for sure.”
Ecclestone even argued Ferrari were reverting back to a previous incarnation and in doing so is actually harming their own chances for success.
“Now it has gone back to being a very Italian team again. And it is run like an Italian team.
“When I got Jean Todt to take his position and go to Maranello, which was a bit of a risk for Jean to do, it was an all-Italian team and they were a bit concerned about taking a foreigner,” he explained.
“But I told them: when you win the championship you sure will find ancestry in Jean’s family that comes from Sicily!
“So I don’t envy Maurizio’s job. I wouldn’t want to do it.”
His comments may even go some way to explaining Sebastian Vettel’s current woes.
The German has fully embraced the culture at Ferrari and showed off his passion a little too exuberantly in Mexico. But while it’s clear he has his garage around him, as he did at Red Bull, the question is whether he can build the entire team around him as he had with Christian Horner and Adrian Newey.
If not that may explain why Ferrari comes across as operationally tangled and why we have seen the four-time world champion do his own thing in regards to strategy and more this season.
Either way, Ecclestone has just one desire from the team next season: “All I hope is that Ferrari get their act together and start winning races,” he said.
Bernie, I don’t think you are the only one.
