Albers not a Doornbos fan.

While they may have shared a common country of origin and a common language, it seems Christijan Albers and Robert Doornbos were hardly the best of friends in the Minardi garage, with Albers revealing that he did not think his team mate helped move the squad forward in their final few races.

Drafted in to replace the cash-strapped Patrick Friesacher from the German Grand Prix onwards, Doornbos was praised through the year by critics, particularly in his home country of Holland. Albers on the other hand is far more sceptical about his countryman according to SpeedTV.com .

"Doornbos is being hyped by the Dutch press as if he's a huge talent. But I keep beating him, so what does that make me? Superman?" Albers fumed.

Although he back tracks somewhat when he claims that Doornbos is 'not a bad driver', Albers' main complaint was his failure to help with the development of the PS05 in their bid to keep ahead of the Jordans. As it happens, Jordan did manage to gain a performance advantage by the end of the year, even if this was mainly due to a revised car.

"The most important part of driving for a team is improving the car and he hasn't done that at all - actually he hasn't made one improvement at Minardi since he joined us," Albers continued. "F1 is all about improving the car. Not about telling everyone how much you enjoyed the GP weekend over and over again.

"He just didn't help the team to go forward. Patrick helped the team go forward - with him we kept improving the car and since Doornbos joined we didn't develop the car that quickly any more..."

His verbal attack comes as Minardi bow out of Formula One, a situation that will put Albers and Doornbos out of a drive for next year following the announcement that the new team, to be named Squadra Toro Rosso, is likely to have Vitantonio Liuzzi and Scott Speed at the wheel.

Following the tirade against his former team mate, it is unlikely that we will be see a 'Double Dutch' bid to claim a seat elsewhere, even if both drivers are heavily funded from various companies in the Netherlands.

Instead, Albers is being mooted for a Williams testing seat, while Doornbos is thought to be chasing a Midland F1 drive next year.