Quote Originally Posted by mknight View Post
I think it's worth turning this around.

When Michelin/BF Goodrich was the sole supplier I don't really recall any drivers saying how bad "Michelin" is.
Rather it was "FIA should allow us mousse" or "stages too rough".

This calling names is basically a thing from Østberg last year (who was paid by Michelin the year before) and Ogier (who is French, which does matter in this case).

How Michelin would fare vs Pirelli in this case is completely unknown as they did not start on Safari last year and were never used on Rally1 cars.

The self-censorship on name calling is certainly there, but that's common for everything else that is "single supplier" in WRC.
Not just Østberg... Pirelli receives similar criticisms in Formula One from a number of drivers for a number of reasons. I don't think you can really dismiss all of that with arguments like "because this guy is French" or "this guy had a deal with rival company x". That can't apply to all of them.

Anyway, they can self-censor all they like, but the part I dislike (and personally, find a little creepy) is when they don't even acknowledge what the driver said. As if they literally did not hear it. I'm not asking them to agree with Ogier. Just at least admit he said what he said. You're supposed to be journalists! When the interests of a corporation and the journalists interviewing them become too entangled, they cease to be journalists and become an unofficial PR department of that corporation.