Tuesday 30 Oktober at 16:17 : David Coulthard is adamant that his former McLaren teammate Kimi Raikkonen is the worthy 2007 champion.

The Finn, who now drives for Ferrari, snatched an unlikely title victory from the hands of Lewis Hamilton, after the McLaren rookie dropped 18 points to Raikkonen in the last two grands prix.

But when asked by the Berlin newspaper 'BZ' if he thought Raikkonen is a lucky or deserving world champion, formula one veteran Coulthard said: "Kimi deserves the title.

"Lewis Hamilton is young and I am sure that he will win more than one championship. Kimi is fast -- probably the fastest driver at the moment.

"He has just had a lot of bad luck in recent years," 36-year-old Coulthard, now driving for Red Bull Racing, added.

'BZ' also probed Coulthard about where he thought McLaren, for whom he raced for nine years until 2004, went wrong in 2007, including the alienation of Fernando Alonso.

"Ron Dennis can sometimes have problems with communication, which can demotivate the drivers. Alonso felt unwanted by his team, which should not have happened.

"We are talking about a double world champion. Instead the title fell to Ferrari by one point," Coulthard added.

Another observer, Renault's engineering director Pat Symonds, also thinks poor management played a role in McLaren's defeat to Ferrari and Raikkonen.

"There was the allowance maybe to let the drivers forget that they were employees so there was a certain amount of mismanagement there," he told the French team's official podcast.

Symonds also said he hopes Hamilton is not awarded the championship at the November 15 appeal.

"It would be a tragedy for the sport after a year like we've had if suddenly a week after the last race we changed our minds about who was world champion," he added.

"So I very much doubt the FIA are going to do anything about it."