Jul.30 (GMM) Former McLaren racer John Watson has characterised the remainder of the 2007 season as a lose-lose situation for the Woking based team.



The 61-year-old Ulsterman, who won five grands prix before retiring in 1985, said that even if Lewis Hamilton or Fernando Alonso emerge from the espionage scandal with the championship, "it will forever be tainted".



"There will always be that stain, that reservation with people asking if the information was used and how long the team had it," Watson told the Sun after McLaren last Friday were found guilty but not penalised by the World Council.



Watson indicated that even he has reservations about his former team, for whom he spent five seasons starting in 1979, and finishing the 1982 drivers' standings in third.



Referring to the spying scandal involving suspended chief designer Mike Coughlan, he said: "McLaren did not just have details about the car but also about how the team operates.



"It was Ferrari's Bible."



Watson also accused the FIA of stirring more negative publicity by handing down such a controversial finding, with even usual Ferrari nemesis Flavio Briatore agreeing that McLaren should have paid "the consequences" having been found guilty.



The verdict has also opened the very real prospect of a Ferrari appeal.



Watson said of F1's governing body: "They haven't helped anybody. The FIA have done more to bring the sport into disrepute by not ending this."