Inside Line: Sad demise of the mighty Williams team

You could argue that with nine constructors' titles they are indeed the second most successful 'team' because only Ferrari have more with 16 title triumphs, while McLaren have eight. The latter have more grand prix wins than Williams.

Today they are a shadow of the formidable outfit they were, the decline has been slow and painful over the past couple of decades.

Today - as the Formula 1 circus sets up tent in Baku ahead of the Azerbaijan Grand Prix - Williams are near the bottom of the pecking order and the light at the end is dim for the Grove outfit.

This year, with the least experienced drivers on the grid and a woefully uncompetitive car, in the FW41, the team is set for their worst season ever.

The story of Sir Frank Williams is legend, how he struggled in the early seventies with low budget F1 projects that delivered little, but in the late seventies in partnership with Patrick Head the team went on to become a powerhouse throughout the eighties and nineties.

Their drivers are icons of the sport and included the likes of Alan Jones, Keke Rosberg, Nelson Piquet, Nigel Mansell, Alain Prost, Ayrton Senna, Damon Hill and Jacques Villeneuve - all who became F1 world champions in Williams colours.

Such was the power of Williams in 1992, after winning the world title with Mansell they allowed him to leave because they would not countenance the Briton's salary demands.

At the time that was the credo that Williams lived by: it's all about the team not about the driver.

In those days they could say that because of who they were and what they achieved - they were the Mercedes of their day.

They had Patrick Head producing a string of race-winning cars and then along came Adrian Newey who weaved his magic and helped produce another spate of superb championship winning cars.

This was the team that could pick and choose drivers while not busting the bank no matter who they lured to their cockpit. Ayrton Senna famously offered to drive for them for free so good were their F1 race cars in the early nineties.

The rot may have begun when they allowed Newey to leave for McLaren. Had they had the foresight at the time they would have broken the bank to keep him, given him substantial shares or partnership, anything to hold on to the genius like Red Bull have done over the years.

Williams did not and I believe they are still paying the price.

Whatever the case, Newey departed having helped Williams to 59 race victories, 78 pole positions and 60 fastest laps all from 114 races from 1991 until the end of 1996. In these seasons, four of their drivers went on to clinch world titles.

Newey's departure to McLaren in 1997 was not the end of Williams' success, although some will argue that the FW19 that won their final F1 title in 1997 had the great designer's signature all over it.

Since then they have not won another championship. Instead, they have twice been runner-up and third on five occasions - in a 20-year period. Their last victory was with Pastor Maldonado at the 2012 Spanish Grand Prix, prior to that they last won a race with Juan Pablo Montoya in 2004.

Important to note, that from 1979 until 2005 they were only twice outside the top five in the constructor's championship, a period when they were the sport's perennial front-runners.

It would be fair and honest to say that these have been two decades of a long drought for Williams, Barcelona 2012, being the only victorious interlude.

Fast forward to 2018 and they now have Paddy Lowe heading the technical side of the team and Claire Williams at the helm as deputy team principal, while 76-year-old Sir Frank has little hands-on input into the team as he did in its heyday, even after the accident that paralysed him.

The first three races of the season have cruelly exposed the shortcomings of a team who this year heralded the arrival of former Ferrari designer Dirk de Beer and the FW41 the first car built under Lowe's watch. Problem is that the car is a lemon.

Although there was a sliver of optimism after the Chinese Grand Prix when the performance of their car was not as woeful as in the first two races.

Nevertheless, Lance Stroll has labelled it the slowest car on the grid while Sergey Sirotkin said he felt like "an idiot" driving around off the pace and at the back of the field.

Clearly, they have some big problems on their hands. Their new car needs a solution to get it back into the mix and right now they do not have the drivers to help the engineers resolve the problem.

By Lowe's own admission, the inexperience of Stroll and Sirotkin does not serve them well in this time of crisis. While their reserve Robert Kubica may have the experience, he has returned to the sport after six years and is hardly in touch with how a modern F1 car should behave.

As a team insider said, "Robert has the experience from the past, but he does not have the know how to evolve and develop the current generation cars because his previous benchmark was a 2011 Renault F1 car. Things have changed immensely since then and when he steps into today's cars it is as if he is a rookie too."

Taking on two pay drivers is a sign of the times for Williams - they need money. With Martini pulling the plug at the end of the year they really needed a strong season not only to keep their drivers' backers happy but also to attract a title sponsor.

As a public company, Williams has to answer to shareholders and soon they may have explaining to do, particularly if results on track start to scare off investors. Company shares peaked at €25.30 per share in January 2013 and are now trading at €17.50 per share.

No matter where your loyalties lie their slow and painful demise has been a hard sideshow to digest because Williams at the back of the grid on a regular basis, as their plight may be this year, is hard to stomach because we so desperately need more teams to punch at the sharp end of proceedings and at one time they were 'The Boss' in F1.

It would be a very sad day for ths port if Williams fades away into oblivion, as did those grand teams of the past that are only a fond memory today. Lotus, Brabham, Tyrrell, Cooper, BRM and Ligier are just some that immediately spring to mind.

For now, as a fan of Formula 1, I sincerely hope that the clever folk at Grove can find that 'magic button' and start on the journey which will return Williams to where they belong: winning and challenging for titles