Ex-Williams head of vehicle performance Rob Smedley f💝ears things could get even worse for his former team ജduring the 2020 Formula 1 season.

Williams suffered its worse season to date as it slipped to the bottom of the constructors’ championship in 20🙈19, managing just a single point across the 21-round campaign in which it had by far the slowest car on the grid.

The British squad, a previously dominant force in F1, has gradually declined in competitivene♏ss since enjoying early success in the V6 hybrid era and finishing as hig⛦h as third in the championship in 2015.

Smedley, who left Williꦕams at the end of a difficult 2018 campaign, insists there𝓀 are no guarantees that things will get better in the forthcoming season.

“There would always be a philosophy that it can’t get any w🉐orse,” Smedley told Reuters.

“Having been around the block a few times in motorsport, and Formula One in particular, [I know] the reality is i💙t can get worse🍸 than this.

“We talk about how it can’t get much worse than 2019, but we said that about 2018🍬, and we said that about 2017. The reality is that 2020 can actually be worse than 2019.

“Anyone who thinks that you c⛎an turn things around from where Williams are now to suddenly arrive back in the top five of the championship, they are very much mistaken. It is juꦚst incorrect.”

S♐medley is concerned that Williams will struggle to make the gains needed to improve in 2020 given i🌊ts relatively small budget compared to the leading teams and described the Grove-based outfit’s fall from grace as a “tragic case”.

“You can be vehemently independent but you n𝐆eed a budget to be⛦ able to do it,” he explained.

“Now I’m on the outsi⭕de I can hope, but when I was on the inside I didn’t want to just hope. It’s 🧸a tragic case. I’m not of the generation that can’t remember when Williams won a world championship.

“To see the decli🍌ne there, it’s heartbreaking really as a Formula ✱1 fan.”