Dennis blames problems on Neweygate

McLaren has been forced to play third fiddle behind Ferrari and Williams in the last two Grands Prix with the latter jumping into second place in the pecking order.

Dennis believes that having to see off a bid from Jaguar to lure Newey away from McLaren could have led to a shift in focus, allowing its rivals to get further ahead.

"If you get it wrong you are off the pace," said Dennis. "The situation with Adrian threw us off balance. To have consistent results, you have to have harmony and when something comes along that is a distraction, it affects the balance of the team."

The Newey saga was settled in McLaren's favour 10 days ago, but the team was stumped for pace at last weekend's European Grand Prix at the Nurburgring with neither David Coulthard nor Mika Hakkinen able to run with Ferrari or Williams.

However, Dennis believes this glitch is only temporary and that his team is more than capable of fighting back.

"To say we have lost direction is ridiculous," he said. "We are confident we can get better results with the package we have. We have been here before and it is not going to be an issue in the long term. We are very determined, but you can't win them all."

Championship leader and Ferrari number one Michael Schumacher also knows that McLaren can certainly not be discounted. The German admits that Coulthard is still a factor, but that first the Woking-based team must get past Williams.

"It looks like Williams is our closest rival," said Schumacher. "Until McLaren fix it, this is a battle of red against blue and white now."

The teams have no post Grand Prix testing this week as round 10 is this weekend at the Magny-Cours circuit in France, leaving McLaren little time to address its problems.