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Cup drivers sympathise with Franchitti

Several leading Sprint Cup drivers sympathised with Dario Franchitti after he lost his drive in the series, but believe he is good enough to be a success in NASCAR

Franchitti's Chip Ganassi Racing team offered him an IndyCar return, but the Scot is eager to make a success of his switch to NASCAR and veteran Jeff Burton believes he could succeed in the Sprint Cup, if given the time to do so.

"I think a couple things happened," Burton said. "Dario is an accomplished racecar driver and I think he can get it done in the Cup Series, but it's going to take time.

"The question is, how patient can people be? And at a time when we don't have a lot of new sponsors coming in it's hard to build a company that wants to be patient. People that are wanting to make that investment want success right away.

"I think a lot of things stacked up against him and it made it harder for him than if he would have been able to have success sooner. Unfortunately Ganassi have been a little down, too. They haven't been as good as you would expect them to be."

Roush Fenway's Greg Biffle added that Franchitti had shown improvement during the season and was shocked by news of his team's closure.

"It's really shocking to us to see a team shut down like that, and it's tough," he said. "You don't want to see that. Dario, I think, is a great driver. He's improved tremendously. He ran very well at Loudon, and qualified decently, but I don't know.

"Their organisation has been having a tough time competition-wise lately, and it's sad to see them without a sponsor and having to shut that down temporarily."

Four-time champion Jeff Gordon believes the lack of funding that led Chip Ganassi Racing to withdraw the No.40 entry could hit anyone in the Sprint Cup given the current status of the economy in the United States.

"I think it's certainly a wake-up call, you know, any of us are vulnerable," Gordon said. "I would have never thought that they would have struggled getting sponsorship.

"I'm sure Chip Ganassi thought they wouldn't struggle. They probably didn't think they'd struggle on the racetrack as much as they have either, especially on the road course."

"We all can be vulnerable and it just makes you appreciate what you have, the sponsors you have, and it makes you work that much harder to try to stay competitive."

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