Jaguar spent most of 2002 showing just how wrong it is possible to get things in Formula One.

The team owned by the world’s second biggest car manufacturer – Ford – was battling with Minardi to stay off the back of the grid for the first half of the season.

The R3, in which much hope had been invested, was an absolute dog of a car.

It handled with the precision of a Victorian pram and had about as much grip as a bicycle on ice.

It was a terrible indictment of three years of misdirected investment and lack of leadership.

Things had become so bad that the very future of the Jaguar team in F1 was being questioned.

Ford set up an internal inquiry aimed at working out how to drag the team out of the mire – and whether it was even worth trying.

Finally, though, Jaguar began to improve.

First, in mid-summer, there was a revised aerodynamic package. Then, a few races later, there was stiffer front suspension. And bit by bit the team began to show some promise.

Ford management publicly pledged their support for the team.

And then Eddie Irvine scored points in two consecutive races in Belgium and Italy – and was even on the rostrum at Monza.

Admittedly this was because Williams and McLaren had an afternoon to forget. But that could not disguise that genuine progress had been made.

Of course, this is the position Jaguar should have been in back in 2000, when Ford first re-branded the Stewart team that it had bought the year before.

But at least it meant that there was some hope for the future of Jaguar.

And after a year like 2002, that was reason enough for its bosses to celebrate.