Moss: Schumacher Not as Good as Fangio or Senna

Sir Stirling Moss said on Wednesday that Michael Schumacher should not be regarded in the same esteem as Juan Manuel Fangio even if he equals the Argentine's record haul of five world crowns this year.

Schumacher is on course to score his fifth world title in nine years this season to equal Fangio's record set in former driver Moss's era during the early days of Formula One in the 1950s.

But Moss, who was forced to settle for second best as he failed to win a world title, insisted that Schumacher should never be put in the same league as Fangio - or even Jim Clark and Ayrton Senna.

"Schumacher is nowhere near as good as Fangio," Moss told the London Evening Standard. "I don't think he is a great. I don't think he's as good as Jim Clark or Ayrton Senna.

"Michael is exceptionally good but he is still making mistakes, as he did at the Nurburgring. Fangio didn't do that. He had one accident which was not his mistake. It happened because he drove all night to get to a race.

"Fangio was a very humble person and very quiet. He had no enemies. He was a bloody good driver and a very nice man. He never did anything dirty. Michael has done a few things which are a bit naughty. Fangio was amazingly fit - he won his last title at the age of 47. It is true there were far fewer races which counted towards the world title but they were much longer.

"Formula One races were a minimum of 300 miles and took over three hours. Now they are about 190 miles and cannot exceed 90 [he meant 120] minutes. Fangio also drove in other races, like we all did. I was doing 57 races a year. The World Championship now is 17 races."

Fangio was 39 when the World Championship was inaugurated but still managed to win 24 of the 51 Grands Prix he contested. In contrast Schumacher has 59 wins from 171 starts. One of those victories came thanks to Ferrari's team orders in Austria when Rubens Barrichello was forced to move over and allow Schumacher to win. That incident disappointed Moss.

"Fangio brought nothing but credit to his sport and you can't say that about Michael," Moss said. "I blamed him entirely for the Austrian episode. Forget all this crap about team orders. He had it within his power not to overtake Rubens, who deserved that win.

"I have no problem with team orders. That's quite acceptable. But Michael didn't need to do it. He would still have gained points over his rivals.

"On the podium he obviously realised it was not a popular win and pushed Rubens on to the top step to make it less embarrassing. It didn't work out. I lost a lot of respect for Michael that day.

"The problem is Michael is so far ahead of the others. Nigel Mansell fought Nelson Piquet, Alain Prost and Senna. Fangio had Alberto Ascari, Giuseppe Farina and myself. We weren't as good because he was the best ever but we were far closer to him than anyone is to Michael.

"Nonetheless Schumacher is far better than any other driver around. If he continues in a car as good as this Ferrari is now and retains his competitive hunger, there is no one with a cat in hell's chance of beating him. But he will never be Fangio's equal."