Let me point a few things out, Bergkamp a Dutch Master is a hypocrite , for instance, I have my own nickname in my id, unlike Bergkamp who has one of his beloved footballer and is too afraid to show his own name and that he hates Schumacher as well as myself, which I can put up with. I am only defending Michael because It seems that his comeback has been exaggerated very much so, after practice he declared that if things went right, the team were only looking at a fourth row position, which he managed. If he didn't it would show he wasn't good enough to get the best out of the car, he did. He is an old person, and to beat someone who is half is age in qualifying is a bit too much to look for, qualifying is a battle for the quickest time, a time trial if you will, there are no points for the fastest time, F1 is based on the fact the the person that can manage to gain the best grid position after the start to the end of the race gains a set amount of points. Michael Schumacher has managed to rein Nico back in towards the middle of the season, my post is only here to respect the fact that he has got all his race skill and brain locked into race mode, if he were to not have the best overtaking record this season, he would get the sack, he arseholes Nico in the race so often, and the race is when it really matters!!! You gain points for a higher position, and if it wasn't for a race day in F1, it would just be rallying ...on tarmac... which is ****. He is here to make the team progress higher and higher every season, and to do that and be a middle aged man is something that I cannot fathom, Mansell was able to sit in the fastest car (the Redbull equivalent of today) and win another championship, as could Lauda. Schumacher is doing something completely challenging, bringing a team up from the bottom, one last time.
Funny, I thought Schumacher's team were constructors champions when he joined. The attack on Bergkamp is out of order, Manny. He was only having a bit of fun. How many Schumacher threads do we need, anyway? This is getting ridiculous. It's about a hair's breadth away from being spam.
Schumacher has gone up in the rankings in my book, If it continues through the season then it's not just a one off. Peter Windsor made a good point on the flying lap: "How often do we see a veteran driver like Michael, (help) bring up a team to WCC+WDC standards. We should be enjoying it not trying to destroy it." Even if Nico was the one to do 70% of the effort and win the WDC, Schumacher's 30% was also the reason for their success and should be congratulated for it because he stuck with it, even if the media were roasting him more than Lewis at every turn.
True words Genji, i dont think its fair to start threads about one driver, whats wrong with the other 23 ?, I think its good to support drivers, but not to a point where that driver can do no wrong, and everyone that does something to him is in the wrong.
Manny, Manny - come on!! I absolutely do not hate you. I don't even dislike you. OK - I accept I have maybe teased you too much about your sincere fan worship of the man. As you have come to realise I am no fan of Schuey. I am probably old enough to be your father or even grandfather - I gave up on hating decades ago. My name? why does it enrage you and other footie fans so much? Hypocrite - how so? - you lost me there. My real first name has already been used - so that is out, and to be honest what with the area I live in I'd be mad to give the extreme nutters on forums the chance to trace me. I was watching the likes of Greaves, Best, Marsh, Bowles etc and rate them just as highly. Its just a name for christs sake. Anyway I'm making peace - can you?
I think a proper judgement of how Schumacher does is to judge him against Rosberg over the season. Sure, it's impressive for a 42 year old to be outdoing Rosberg, but it's a very different story when that 42 year old is Schumi. The ulimate what-if is to imagine what Schumacher would be doing if he was in Webber's shoes right now.
Has Rosberg been proven himself though? I think he needs to be judged against somebody like Button, Hamilton,Alonso, webber or massa. It could be that both nico and MS are not performing
Schumacher on an average day is no worse than Button when he's not on it. When Button gets everything right, he's probably the best out there. And while the same might still be true for Schumi, he's had one of those races in the last 30, to Button's six or seven.
I think this is the key question to this debate. Rosberg is a strongish 'midfield driver' in my opinion, in that he has reasonable race pace. But in terms of racecraft, he appears to crumble too easily, too often. He is not good at defending his position and compared to most of the other drivers of front running teams, it is my impression (I have not checked statistics) that he seems to achieve fewer competitive overtakes - although he did better than usual in this regard today. In spite of what appears to be this 'ordinariness', he is out-performing Schumacher without much effort. In my opinion, the Mercedes is a good car but compared to the other top teams, it is their drivers who are not doing it justice. And for the logic of this debate, I do not think anyone would realistically suggest that Mercedes are the fifth best or worse. That means that if we were to idealise all drivers as 'average', Mercedes should have drivers who achieve no lower than 7th and 8th by the end of a World Championship. Rosberg achieved this 'mean' last season but Schumacher did not: he was 9th !
