In the wake of a poignant race in relation to the current state of Formula One in Australia, Bernie Ecclestone has slammed the Manor team for their "no show" at the opening race of the 2015 season.
After leaving administration just a few weeks before the opening Grand Prix of the season, the team were always going to be pushed for time when they finally made it to Oz; notably naming their second driver Roberto Merhi just four days before the start of the first race weekend of the year and not taking part in any of the pre-season tests.
However, the team were unable to get any running in over the weekend due to software gremlins occurring as a result of correlation issues between their 2015 car and 2014 software. As a result of pulling this "no show" the team was summoned to the FIA to explain the reasoning behind it, though they accepted the teams reason and thus issued no penalty to the team.
But, Bernie Ecclestone came out and controversially stated his opinion in that he felt Manor had no intention of racing in Australia. In an interview with Reuters, the Formula One supremo went on to state: "We should have never ever, ever allowed Manor to do what they've done. It's our fault. I predicted this would happen,they had no intention of racing in Australia. Zero. They couldn't have raced if someone had gone there with a machine gun and put it to their head. It was impossible. So they had no intention."
As a result of this, the Manor team will be made to pay for their freight costs to Australia - usually Formula One Management pays for the freights costs of all the teams, however Ecclestone stated that 'they are not competing so they have to pay for it'.
