Williams 'needs to rediscover pain of failure' - Coulthard

Former Formula 1 driver David Coulthard says that Williams needs to rediscover its passion for motorsport if it's to find success in the future.

In particular, Coulthard - who drove for the team from 1994 until 1995 - felt that Williams was no longer motivated by the sting of failure as it had been in the past.

“Williams I’m a little bit concerned for,” Coulthard told Motorsport.com this week. "I just don’t see the pain of failure that maybe we saw in the past.

"You can fool people about how you’re feeling, but you can’t fake passion," he continued. "I’d love to see that passion come back to Williams.

“The paddock has a great deal of affection for Williams and what they’ve achieved," he added. "But of course things move on and that will dwindle over time. I hope they can turn it around.”

Williams are currently at the bottom of the constructors championship with just one points finish so far this season. An ambitious approach to car design has backfired, leaving the team scrambling to get back on track.

• Williams doomed to last place in 2018, admits Sirotkin

Another struggling team with an illustrious heritage in Formula 1 is McLaren. Coulthard drove for that squad for nine seasons and won all but one of his 13 Grands Prix victories with them.

He said McLaren's collapse in form in recent years was "confusing" and said that it always came down to people.

The exit of long-time boss Ron Dennis undoubtedly left a big hole to fill at Woking, with Martin Whitmarsh and Eric Boullier among those ultimately proving unable to fill the gap.

“Ron Dennis used to say to me, ‘I don’t design the car. I don’t build the car. And I don’t drive the car. So all of those elements are not my responsibility’," said Coulthard, who is now a pundit and co-commentator for Channel 4's Formula 1 television coverage.

"His responsibility was the vision for the company, getting sponsors on board, giving the engineers the resources they need to come up with a good car.

"[So] the people with the power to design and build the car have either not had the resources at their disposal, or they’ve misused those resources, and therefore they are accountable."

Now it's up to newly appointed CEO Zak Brown and sporting director Gil de Ferran to steady the ship and steer McLaren back to winning ways. Coulthard says he's cautiously optimistic that they will pull it off.

“I think Zak and Gil, someone with a great racing mind, they will turn it around. But it will take time."

McLaren's immediate fortunes likely depend on whether they can persuade Fernando Alonso to stay with the team for another season, rather than heading off to compete in World Endurance Racing or IndyCar full time in 2019.

Alonso tweeted a countdown teaser to a forthcoming big announcement coming on Tuesday - but it's not necessarily connected to his racing future:

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