According to an article in the latest issue of Bernie Ecclestone’s F1 Magazine, there is a lot more to Eddie Jordan’s sacking of Heinz-Harald Frentzen than meets the eye.
The article alleges that Eddie first started thinking about dropping Frentzen at the end of the 2000 season. The Irishman was desperate to hold on to fifth place in the Constructors’ Championship, however with Frentzen failing to finish in both races - as a result of gearbox and steering problems - the Silverstone outfit slipped to sixth their worst season in many years.
Jordan, known for his sense of humour, was so disappointed that he cancelled the team’s Christmas party claiming that there was nothing to celebrate.
This year, when Frentzen criticised the car during pre-season testing, Jordan and many of the team’s senior engineers were angry, particularly when the German chose to voice his opinions on his personal website. While Frentzen was ridiculing the car so Jordan was doing his utmost to placate both Honda and his many sponsors.
Once the season was underway, Jordan became convinced that Frentzen’s heart was no longer in it, the German blamed the car for a string of retirements while the team’s engineers claimed it was actually the driver that was at fault.
However, while Frentzen was complaining about the EJ11, his team-mate, Jarno Trulli, was regularly out-qualifying him and at least bringing the car home, scoring nine points to the German’s six.
The writing was on the wall, Jordan wanted to be rid of Frentzen however he didn’t have a replacement for the German who would also be sure to demand a massive pay-off. Furthermore there was also the question of how the team’s sponsors and fans would react.
Meanwhile, Jean Alesi was having major problems with Prost. The French team hadn’t paid him and in a major row at Magny Cours Alesi demanded his outstanding salary, believed to be in the region of $2m. Prost simply doesn’t have the money to pay his driver, and former friend, however rather than trying to placate the mercurial French-Sicilian, Prost decides to push him a little bit harder by getting the team’s lawyer to warn him that he won’t be paid until the end of the year at the earliest, in addition to fining him for adverse comments he made about the team.
The highly emotional Alesi poured his heart out to his former employer (Jordan), who finally saw a way out of his Frentzen dilemma. Prost meanwhile thought he could push Alesi as hard as he liked, as the former Ferrari star had nowhere else to go. The Irishman was keen to do a deal whereby Alesi and Frentzen would swap seats in time for the British GP, however it was not to be.
Even before the European GP Jordan’s mind was made up, Frentzen had to go. However that’s when rumours began to circulate suggesting that the German might retire. The day before the Nurburgring event, Jordan issued a press release in which it was announced that Frentzen would remain with the team for 2002, however Eddie’s mind was apparently already made up, he had no intention of paying Heinz-Harald $6m for another poor season.
Deutsche Telecom had made a TV commercial featuring Heinz-Harald which as to be aired in the weeks preceding the German GP, Jordan, not wishing to cause the company embarrassment - or risk losing them as a sponsor - came clean and allegedly told their sponsorhip manager of his intention to sack Frentzen. As a result an alternative TV commercial was filmed, this one featuring team boss Eddie Jordan himself.
With Jordan convinced that a deal could be done whereby Frentzen would swap seats with Alesi, even if it cost a few million dollars, the Irishman sacked his German star. Earlier in the season he had seen Prost accept a somewhat similar situation when he took Luciano Burti and several million dollars from Jaguar in exchange for test driver Pedro de la Rosa.
Seemingly, Eddie Jordan sacked Frentzen by fax on Friday July 20, amazingly the German didn’t make this public - via his website - until almost a full week later.
Had Alain Prost been able to come up with the cash to pay Alesi, Jordan’s master-plan’ would have been destroyed, but the French team simply didn’t have the cash. Therefore when the news broke that Frentzen had been fired, Prost realised that he’d made a dreadful mistake and was powerless to stop his former friend from changing teams.
In Thursday’s FIA press conference Heinz-Harald once again made it clear that he intended taking the matter to court while earlier this week Jordan denied that he had sacked his former driver by fax claiming the he ‘loves him very much’.
Source: http://www.planet-f1...f1/ENG?ref=7178
