This situation is frustrating for all us fans, especially when there are only two other manufacturers in the WRC class but there is little point in attacking Gus or even M-Sport (which I have probably been guilty of too). Thinking things through there is no logical reason why M-Sport should or would want to spend too much of their own money other than for Malcolm’s personal enjoyment or vanity, when:

- The project is not paid for by a manufacturer and they have no incentive to give the best performance to retain that backing

- As far as i’m aware there are no cash prizes for manufacturers in WRC (as there are in F1 for example)

- There is no real market for selling or renting these vehicles to privateers

- There seems to be very little in the way of external sponsorship coming into WRC other than from subsidiaries or partners of manufacturers.

Fingers crossed things change for the hybrid era. Perhaps Ford can be persuaded to open their wallet if they can get some marketing mileage out of the hybrid technology or maybe Mikelssen can get Red Bull to offer some backing to the team in the same way they did to get Ogier in a Fiesta when VW pulled out.