F1 grids will shrink in 2015

But, with Lewis Hamilton only having to finish second to his team mate Nico Rosberg the level of excitement is rather contained – not quite the effect Bernie Ecclestone was striving for when he originally mooted the bizarre concept.

It was a strange weekend in Brazil with the sport’s and a few of the team’s future under discussion.

The big surprise was the rapid turn round in Bernie Ecclestone’s attitude as the F1 boss changed his view on the smaller teams accusing Caterham and Marussia of poor financial management.

This comes from the man who just over a week ago was telling the world he was partially to blame for the current financial problems in the sport, but did not know how to fix them.

Following a meeting with the team principals at the Interlagos circuit last Saturday where the various problems and the engine freeze situation were discussed, the result was a stalemate with none of the issues resolved and Ecclestone restoring his bombastic approach to the plight of the smaller teams.

He is quoted as saying. “People say F1 is in crisis, absolute nonsense. We’ve had a couple of teams in crisis.” He told the media he has little sympathy for teams such as Marussia and Caterham who created their own problems with unsustainable debt. He continued. “People come and go. They need to know how much is coming in and how much is going out”.

His advice to teams was to spend less instead of hoping someone will subsidise them. Now, that is an interesting scenario.

How does one spend less in a sport which demands a constant baseline expenditure of millions of dollars, made worse by the nonexistent cost cuts and caps that were mooted earlier in the year?

The major teams have rejected control on expenditure and by this action are effectively eliminating any serious new entries into the sport, a situation that does not appear to worry Ecclestone or CVC Partners.

Perhaps as more teams drop away, interest in F1 wanes even further and the shareholders profit is reduced, someone will begin to realise that it is all going horribly wrong.

One voice of reason was Niki Lauda of Mercedes who said. “In difficult economic times like these, where sponsors are hard to find, we need to help the small teams. This is also in our interest because they also need to spend money on tyres and engines.”

As an engine supplier Mercedes profits from their clients and certainly does not wish to lose them.

One thing that puzzles me is the prize money that is due to the now defunct Marussia team – some $40 million (R448 million).

If this is money due to them, why could it not have been used to assist the financially crippled team, perhaps giving them enough time to find a possible buyer? Ecclestone claims he cannot permit this as he would have to do the same to all the teams, sure, but not all of the teams were in Marussia’s situation.

Apparently during the meeting those same funds were being discussed with the idea of redistributing the money to assist smaller teams. Ironic when the team that earned the $40 million cannot be helped.

Now it looks as though we have yet another team battling for survival. Vijay Mallya’s Force India joins Lotus, Sauber and Caterham in the fight for survival.

If we lose them it means that only six teams with twelve cars will take the grid in Melbourne next March.