Villeneuve slams 'destroyer' Richards.

Jacques Villeneuve has hit out at his former boss, David Richards - who of course sacked him at the end of 2003.

The Canadian, who has been given a second chance in Formula One, following Peter Sauber's decision to sign him for 2005, added that DR 'poisoned' the paddock against him.

"Richards was angry at [former BAR boss] Craig [Pollock] for reasons which didn't concern me," he told British newspaper, The Guardian.

"His way of getting at Craig was to get at me because I was part of the team before him. Richards didn't like that. That's what he does with everyone. If you look at his career, even in rally driving, you'll see he spends a lot of time destroying people. I don't know why. Maybe it makes him feel good and powerful.

"The media and the paddock went along with Richards - and that disillusioned me. Now he is gone the paddock is positive towards me again and that's great, but I'm sure it will take only five minutes for them to turn. Whenever you speak your mind in F1, 90 per cent of the media will use it against you because they still want to go to the teams and have their meals and glasses of wine - and then a few years later they say, 'Oh, you did the right thing.'

"It doesn't help to be honest in F1; it just makes life difficult. But I guess you sleep well because you know you are true to yourself."

"I don't regret leaving Williams though - because BAR came good," he added.

"It was always going to take a few years for the hard work to come to fruition. Sadly I wasn't there when it came together. So the move from Williams wasn't a bad thing. The bad thing was David Richards.

"People always said that there was bad blood between me and Jenson Button. But that was just part of Richards' plan. It was never about me and Jenson - we actually got on. It was always down to Richards.

"Jenson is very fast. There's no doubt about that. He's also a hard worker. He had a strong season last year and that will give him confidence. Jenson's up there with the best but he's yet to win a race. That's the next step. But when he says him and Kimi [Raikkonen] and [Juan Pablo] Montoya are [Michael] Schumacher's equal, I just look at Michael's seven world championships.

"He's far ahead."