Nigel Roebuck: Fifth Column

The endless stream of self-righteous pronouncements from Maranello is getting a little tiresome, as far as I'm concerned. We all know what happened this year - the passing of confidential Ferrari documents from Nigel Stepney to Mike Coughlan, and so on - but McLaren have been very severely punished, and now would seem a very good moment for everyone to move on.

Unfortunately, this looks unlikely, if recent news stories from Italy are anything to go by. In Mugello last weekend, Jean Todt was still full of self-pity. "We suffered," he said, "and there were many unhappy moments." No distinction in that, as Ron Dennis can tell you.

"I wouldn't have expected," Todt went on, "this betrayal from one of ours, who for personal reasons wanted to help another team, and I didn't expect them [McLaren] to accept his help."

Ever since the 'Spygate' affair came to light, and particularly since the FIA World Motor Sport Council considered the matter, and delivered its verdict, I have been struck by a recurring thought: if McLaren were obliged to accept responsibility for the actions of Coughlan (and rightly so), why were not Ferrari required to do the same in the case of Stepney, the man who started it all? It was not, after all, as though a gang of McLaren desperadoes scaled the walls of Maranello.

Still, the fact remains that Coughlan could have rebuffed Stepney's offer, and in choosing not to he must have known the potential repercussions should word get out. One very good way of keeping quiet about being in possession of 780 pages of someone else's confidential information is not to take it to a photocopying shop. That, I confess, I still find numbing.

Another good way of keeping shtum is not to tell anyone else, but this, too, apparently failed to occur to Coughlan, as evidenced by the email correspondence between Pedro de la Rosa and Fernando Alonso.

It was around the time of the first race, in Melbourne, that Stepney suggested to Coughlan that it might be worth bringing the flexi-floor of the Ferrari F2007 to the attention of the FIA's Charlie Whiting. After the race - won by Kimi Raikkonen - Whiting ruled against it, and it was not used again. Odd, though, that a Ferrari man might think a Ferrari component worthy of investigation.

Let's move on to company president Luca di Montezemolo, interviewed in Italy last week. "It was the season of venom," he thundered. "We've seen people lying, people improving the performance of their cars in an unsporting manner, we've seen our work distracted by trying to find irrefutable proof of this unfair behaviour."

The worst moment of the year, di Montezemolo said, was when the WMSC's verdict was announced. "It was an absurd verdict" - well, few would take issue with that - "that acknowledged there was unfairness, but this unfairness was not highlighted in the decision." So what would have been acceptable? A thousand million dollars?

In fact, his anger stemmed chiefly from the fact that, while McLaren were excluded from the constructors' championship, the drivers' points were allowed to remain - which, let's not forget, kept the world championship alive, with four races to go.

"The verdict was unacceptable," said di Montezemolo. "It created a precedent that allows the absurd principle whereby a jockey races with a doped horse, and in the end he wins, anyway."

Changing the subject completely, can anyone tell me which team finished one-two in the 1999 Malaysian Grand Prix? Floors me. The only thing I can remember is that the team in question beat McLaren to the constructors' championship that year. By four points.

The most significant aspect of the di Montezemolo interview, I thought, was his insistence on heaping praise on Alonso, whom he described as, "A real champion, in every sense, an extraordinary driver." No argument about that, but I rather doubt that most at McLaren would go along with Luca's further point: "I've really appreciated his sportsmanship. He lost the championship by a point, and I don't think it was his fault; rather it was the consequence of his team's bad internal management."

On the one hand, you could say this was gratuitously sticking the boot into McLaren, but it also served to foster the belief that di Montezemolo is determined to have Alonso at Ferrari, alongside Raikkonen. It was he, after all, who was the impetus behind Kimi's move to Ferrari, which in turn persuaded Michael Schumacher to retire perhaps a little earlier than he might have wished. Recently a new three-year contract with Felipe Massa was announced, but many doubt that it will go the distance.

At present Alonso is in discussion with several teams about 2008, but is insistent that he is looking for a one- year deal only and that rather fuels speculation that he intends to be Maranello-bound in '09. Since Interlagos, Alonso has been fulsome in his praise of Raikkonen, saying that he was 'very happy' that Kimi had won the championship - which some have cynically interpreted as being 'very happy' that Hamilton had not won it.

Question is, who will partner Lewis at McLaren next year? There have been suggestions of a move by Alonso back to Renault, with Kovalainen moving in the other direction, but somehow I don't see that happening. I'm sure RD has a pretty short short-list, and logic suggests that the man he would most like to see alongside Hamilton is Nico Rosberg, for me the driver who made the biggest stride in 2007.

Think about it. At Williams they are not easily impressed by racing drivers, and have an absolute horror of prima donnas. Rosberg is calm and analytical, a young man who works very hard at his job - and is also a hell of a racer, as we saw in his fight with the BMWs at Interlagos. Very much Patrick Head's sort of racing driver.

Nico is also unusually apolitical, and tends not to scream and shout when things go wrong, a quality always highly valued by a team. Plus, he knows Hamilton well, having been his karting team-mate years ago, and has a good relationship with him. It would surprise me if he were not McLaren's first choice to replace Alonso.

As for Fernando, well, who knows where he will finish up next year? But let us suppose that he does find a berth with Ferrari in 2009. If he has had problems coping with the competitiveness of Hamilton, why should it be any easier with Raikkonen? Well, for one thing, because Kimi is a long established, world class driver, and no one can be reasonably expected to have the regular beating of him. Nor, for that matter, could any team-mate of Raikkonen's start banging on about 'number one' status. Alonso's problem has been coping with being beaten by a rookie.

All season I have had the belief that if Raikkonen, rather than Alonso, had been Hamilton's team-mate, McLaren would have had a much easier time, because Kimi doesn't give a damn about what the guy in the other car is doing.

And I also suspect if Alonso had been partnered by anyone other than Hamilton, he would have won the world championship. It was the mix that was wrong - and the right mix is vital in a top team. Perhaps Frank Williams is correct in his belief that "You can't put two bulls in a field", but if Alonso is one day to join Raikkonen at Ferrari, it seems to me that a McLaren pairing of Hamilton and Rosberg might be the thing to have.

For now, though, let's have no more talk of 'doped horses'. Or even, for a while at least, prancing ones.