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Bernie Ecclestone will shortly also commence legal action against the FOTA members threatening to set up a breakaway series.

The governing FIA on Friday announced that it is suing the eight teams, with a particular emphasis on Ferrari, but Max Mosley said at Silverstone that it is Ecclestone's impending actions they should be most worried about.

"Bernie, as the commercial rights holder, will sue them too," the FIA President told the Mirror.

Mosley said the FIA's action will focus on breach of contracts and also competition law violations.

"There is a quite a lot of money at stake for us but for Bernie it is a massive amount of money," he said. "The teams will all owe him money."

Mosley said every team in the FOTA group has been paid commercial revenues for the coming seasons in advance, so Ecclestone will be asking for it back.

"In the case of one team, that would be in excess of £100m pound. In every other case, it is tens of millions of pounds," he said.

The political crisis has been characterised by some as a push for the heads not only of Mosley, but Ecclestone too. But Mosley insists it has little to do with the individual figureheads.

"They want to grab the money and the sporting power. Well, I won't let them grab the sporting power and Bernie won't let them grab the money," he insisted.

Source: GMM
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