Tough for Raikkonen to come back - Herbert

If Kimi Raikkonen is planning a return he will find it tough as he left in a 'sour way', says former Formula One driver Johnny Herbert. Adding that with the Finn leaving the Scuderia Ferrari a year early and bound for the World Rally Championship, returning will be difficult as he should've stayed to prove his worth.

“It's a shame for him. At the end of the day, I think for Kimi to say he'll have a rallying year and then come back for 2011 is a bit tough, because he's left probably in a sour way," Herbert told 'Crash.net Radio'.

Adding this to explain his point of view, “Felipe was basically beating him all the time and we never seem to see the old Kimi anymore, the old spark of Kimi. He had that good sort of mid-season from the Hungarian Grand Prix where he finished second, and he did well in Valencia and Belgium, so he had a couple of good races – but then at the end, it sort of faded again. I don't know all the ins-and-outs of Ferrari itself, but we never saw that sparkle from him.

“To go out of it and then try and get back in again I think is a very hard thing, because there's always new blood about and coming up, and if that new blood does the right thing in GP2 for example, then they're going to be trying to get in. We've got young drivers that are already there trying to make their point, so it's a sticky position because the places that he might think are there may not be there. He might come back and have to go to a lower team, which is not what he wants."

Raikkonen made it clear that if he was to continue in F1 it would have to be with a top team, and as practically all those seats were filled, he had no choice but to say goodbye, while at the same time fulfilling his promise of Ferrari being his last team.