Mosley defends Ferrari

Rival teams have accused the FIA of colluding with Ferrari regarding new technical rules, offering the team uniquely favourable financial deals in the new Concorde Agreement, and of having double-standards in its application of the sporting and technical regulations by allegedly penalising other teams more harshly than Ferrari.

Speaking to the press in London today, Mosley claimed that the major British teams were actually the ones who were harming F1.

"Ferrari is not killing the sport," he said. "It is Williams, McLaren, Renault and BAR to some extent killing the sport because they are doing a rubbish job and they go around saying we have got a special relationship with Ferrari."

Mosley said that Ferrari's success was not down to favours from the governing body, but to the efforts of its sporting director Jean Todt.

"The secret of Ferrari is Jean Todt," he said. "Since getting in there he has (put together) a cohesive unit where everyone pulls on the same side. He is a fantastic manager. I am sure he and his team would have achieved the same in any one of the top teams had they have joined it."

Ferrari has dramatically distanced itself from the other nine F1 teams in recent months. The Italian team refused to sign up to the testing restrictions and cost-cutting measures proposed by all their rivals in Brazil last October. Then in late January, Ferrari abandoned the GPWC alliance and committed itself to Bernie Ecclestone's vision of F1 until at least 2012. Todt was also the only team principal not to boycott Mosley's recent cost-cutting meeting at Heathrow.