Formula One news

Alonso coup is McLaren 'disaster' - Lauda

Former driver and team boss Niki Lauda has shaken his head at Fernando Alonso's switch from Renault to McLaren. The outspoken 56-year-old Austrian criticised Ron Dennis, his former employer and team principals' colleague, for announcing the coup a week before Christmas '05.

"Everything he could do wrong, he has done wrong," Lauda told Germany's Bild newspaper. "Ron has forgotten that humans aren't machines -- they have emotion."

Niki called the timing of the Spaniard's signing - about a year before Alonso's first McLaren test - a 'disaster'. He reckons Alonso, plus current McLaren duo Kimi Raikkonen and Juan Pablo Montoya, all have their noses out of joint.

First, Niki Lauda suggests, 'iceman' Kimi is no longer the golden boy at the silver clad team. "In this deal, there are only losers," the ex-triple world champion said. "Alonso will have trouble with his Renault team in 2006. And Montoya now has to perform in the knowledge that he is only McLaren's third choice."

To the 'Sport1' publication, meanwhile, former German GP driver Hans-Joachim Stuck reckons the Alonso move was pretty predictable. "It looks like Renault will stop the F1 programme in a year or two."

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