Eddie Jordan has provided a clarification on his recent infamous “silent assassin” comment, and although it was not Christian Horner’s words, he believes the team boss owes him a “debt” because he is “no longer on the front pages”.
After weeks of speculation, Red Bull announced ahead of the Miami Grand Prix that design guru Adrian Newey will leave the team in the first quarter of next year.
“That was just you. Thank you for pointing that out.”
In a Red Bull press release, Newey thanked Jordan and revealed that the former F1 team principal is the 65-year-old’s manager.
Fellow Jordan, Formula for Success podcaster David Coulthard, hailed the discovery that “76-year-old Eddie Jordan” was none other than Newey’s manager.
Jordan responded: “DC, I’m just concerned… it’s just for the benefit of the casters out there. Casters, do you know what he called me? Do you know what he called me when he found this out?”
“First of all, his chin was right at the end of his trousers, and you know, his chin is pretty big to begin with, so he could actually get that deep – it’s a pretty wide chin.
“But he called me and said, ‘Oh, EJ, you’re such a silent assassin.’
“So, I don’t know what a Silent Assassin is. DC, can you tell me what it is?”
However, while “he called me” was thought to be Horner calling Jordan, it was actually Coulthard who called the Irishman the “silent assassin”.
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Speaking on the latest edition of the podcast, Coulthard claimed that while Jordan has “blamed a lot of people, and usually does so in a qualified capacity”, they both know it was “in fact” a Scotsman who made the silent assassin comments.
When asked if he called Horner and told him it was “stupid DC” who made the comments, Jordan replied: “I probably would have, but Christian has been in a lot of media attention over the last few months and, as we all know, there was one incident that was very similar to that.”
“Something I said was picked up and misquoted. This was long before the verdict and the outcome of the King’s Council came out. I think Christian heard something in the media through somebody else or I should have said something that I definitely did not say.”
“I was ignoring what was said about the silent assassin. It was definitely you. Thanks for bringing that up. But Christian was mad at me. This is ridiculous because this is the second time this has happened.”
“I’ve been friends with Christian for over 30 years. He came over to buy my team many years ago and I know him and his family and we all grew up together in the area.
“It is completely nonsense for the media to report something that could potentially affect our future friendship and relationship.”
But Jordan, calling it a “narrative thing” in a “fickle medium,” feels Horner should actually be grateful, or “beneficent,” for keeping him off the front page.
“For example, there was a bit of an attack on Christian and then all of a sudden the Adrian Newey thing came up and Christian was no longer on the front page. It was all Adrian’s fault.”
“So I think he owes me a favour, because I think I distracted the media. It wasn’t intentional, but it just happened. They got distracted by Adrian Newey and gave Christian a bit of breathing room.”
“So that’s how I see it, but I’m obviously biased and I see things in my favor, just like you see things in your favor.”
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