Former team boss claims Lewis is NOT one of F1’s top-four drivers

The Lewis Hamilton backlash continues apace. In the past few weeks, the McLaren driver has been criticised by the media, other drivers… hell, everyone except Ron Dennis and his dad, it seems.

Now Giancarlo Minardi, founder of the Minardi team (duh), has added his thoughts on Lewis’s difficult second season. Minardi claimed that Hamilton was not one of the four best drivers in F1: “Robert Kubica has committed no errors, with his only tally of zero points in Australia with the collision with Nakajima; that was not his fault… Without that, he would be far ahead in the championship,” Minardi said.

“Another one, certainly, is Fernando Alonso, who even with an uncompetitive machine always shows something. And, of course, the two Ferrari drivers [Kimi Raikkonen and Massa].”

Minardi went on to say of Hamilton: “At the moment, he is committing very serious errors of inexperience and displays an excess of nervousness… over the next Grand Prix [at Silverstone] he must demonstrate his ability to improve in these areas.”

If Lewis is committing serious errors of inexperience, then that is because he is an inexperienced F1 driver. We tend to forget that, especially after his astonishing debut season.

One man who has come out and defended Lewis is Honda boss Ross Brawn. Speaking to BBC Sport, Brawn said:

“We all tend to forget how young he is, and how this is all lots of new experiences for him. I was fortunate enough to be with Michael Schumacher when he went through this learning curve, and it was no different.

“The attention that these young guys get is enormous pressure, and something that no-one can really help them with. No-one can really advise them what they should be doing. So they have to learn the hard way and learn themselves. Lewis is certainly capable of being a World Champion. It’s just a question of how the car goes and how the dice roll.”

We don’t disagree with Minardi, but Brawn speaks more sense.