Editor's Desk: Is it Andretti's fault F1 teams struggled?

The politicking behind the scenes between the FIA, the teams, and Formula One Management (FOM) has been building up day by day ever since the the sport's governing body approved Andretti Cadillac's application to become an F1 team.

No we all know the only issue behind having an extra team is money, as teams are worried that they will have to share the revenue pie with one more party.

In his latest "Green Book" blog - an enjoyable and frequent read of mine - which he penned in the aftermath of the Qatar Grand Prix, veteran F1 journalist, Joe Saward suggested that it was not the time to have a new team in F1 because some of the existing teams are struggling financially.

Saward also referred to what Williams boss James Vowles, who staunchly opposes adding a new F1 team, said over the weekend in Qatar.

Vowles said: "My thoughts are very clear. Williams is against the addition of an eleventh team, and very strongly against, but I'll explain the reasons behind that and why.

"My responsibility is to 900 employees, if you go to Companies House you can go and look up Williams, who have submitted it now, you can go and see the losses, 2021 to 2022. It is losses in the tens of millions and more, compared to 2023 which you won't see but I'll guarantee you, it's multiples above that.

"The reasons why is we're investing in this sport to become better, we believe in the way in which the sport is going and the direction of travel," he insisted.

"I'd say the addition of an eleventh team is a sensible thing but only at the point where the tenth team on the grid is financially stable," Vowles went on.

"We believe in what we're doing to invest in what we're doing, but we need to take care as a sport to look after that, and everyone says we're in a good place - we are in some regards, but now those facts down the line actually it's tens of millions, or hundreds of millions you'll see shortly, being invested to make the sport better, it becomes therefore clear why we're very careful about diluting what we've already got.

"More than happy to bring in new entities but the pie has to grow as a result of it, not shrink," Vowles concluded.

Joe also referred to the collapse of Force India and Lawrence Stroll's takeover back in 2018, turning it into Racing Point, then Aston Martin, citing it as a recent example of an F1 team struggling financially and falling apart.

But that got me thinking, how is it Andretti's fault that Williams are struggling financially?

Don't get me wrong, I have a soft spot for Williams being the last of the Garagistas, although it stopped being that since Frank Williams relinquished control to his daughter Claire.

Williams has been mismanaged for years, with no investment injected into it and the result in the sorry mess Vowles is trying to rebuild now, but that should not be a reason not to add a new team.

And for those who suggest Andretti should buy an existing F1 team, like FOM and some team bosses are suggesting... Why do Andretti have to go for a struggling existing F1 operation that may prove un-fixable? Maybe starting from a clean slate with no excess baggage is a better route?

Again, it is about the money, and believe me none of the other teams give a sh!t about Williams. Remember how they acted when Vowles requested to have more capital expenditure to try and rebuild the team's decaying facilities?

They all blackmailed Williams and did not approve their $20-Million increase in CAPEX before everyone got extra to spend as well.

Furthermore, Williams were struggling financially back when when F1, the FIA, and all ten teams welcomed Virgin, Lotus, and Hispania in 2010. In retrospect, those teams were destined to fail but they were accepted anyway. Even by the strugglers.

What about Haas? Guenther Steiner's job is to keep Gene Haas' F1 team afloat. Seldom are the cars upgraded, as they seem content to be the journeymen of F1, which defies the meritocracy ethos that is bandied about.

All the teams are opposing Andretti, each with its own interests in mind, without apparently caring about the best interests of F1. I wish they would just have the balls to be honest about it and say it as it is.