Three days before Ferrari bow their heads in shame and take whatever punishment the FIA decides to hand down for the Italian team's trangressions in Austria and suddenly we have new Ferrari team orders.

At yesterday's European Grand Prix, Michael Schumacher crossed the finish line and dived towards his team's pit wall in celebration, but not before Rubens Barrichello had done the same, the Brazilian allowed to take his second career victory, two years after his first win in Germany at the Hockenheimring.

A plethora of coincidences anyone?

While it certainly smacked of Schumacher's bosses at Ferrari trying to curry favour in the midst of a rumour storm that suggests the team and its drivers may be severely penalised with the loss of points in Paris on Wednesday, the coincidences paled beside Barrichello's joy on rightfully claiming the top step of the podium after 60 laps.

Over the last two and a half seasons, Barrichello has been the model manservant for Schumacher - protesting little, aiding much and, save for the occasional loose word, playing the forelock-tugging help-mate to perfection.

This was his brief reward and he lapped it up like a cat who's staged a smash and grab at a dairy. He gurned and grinned, skipped and hopped his way around the podium, brandishing a Brazilian flag as much in celebration of his country's sporting achievements over the weekend as Ferrari's.

England beaten by the national soccer team in Japan, Germany beaten by Barrichello at the Nurburgring. Barrichello, who yesterday held the Brazilian flag high above German soil, had the look of a man making a World Cup final prediction.

And, to be fair, his victory here wasn't wholly a case of Ferrari playing recalcitrant schoolboys brought to book for firing spitballs at the headmaster.

Barrichello dominated the race from the start. The Ferrari number two snuck down the inside of pole winner Juan Pablo Montoya and second-placed Ralf Schumacher and, as the younger Schumacher and Montoya tussled for the lead, Barrichello avoided all trouble and slotted in behind Ralf as he won the battle of the Williams'.

On a two-stop strategy, Barrichello soon dismissed the more heavily-fuelled Ralf Schumacher. Schumacher the elder, meanwhile, was past Montoya after a brief struggle and was hot on the heels of his team-mate.

Once the Ferraris had disappeared beyond the horizon of recapture, the only issue was whether Ferrari sporting director Jean Todt would call on Barrichello to move aside.

Pushing hard to close a one-second gap, Schumacher spun when he outbraked himself at the RTL Kurve grinding down from 170 m.p.h. to 70 m.p.h..The episode cost him 11 seconds and the chance to pass Barrichello.

He pitted on the next lap and set about attempting to once again reel Barrichello in.

By the time the window for the team's second stop arrived he had done that, when Barrichello came in for his second stop with just 27 seconds in hand over Schumacher.

But Schumacher was jammed in behind back markers and losing the advantage. Barrichello took the circuit five seconds ahead of his team-mate.

Fifteen laps later and Barrichello was across the finish line, in first, ahead of Schumacher, on merit.

For a brief while, it looked like Montoya would take third. But the Colombian eventually cracked, losing control under pressure from David Coulthard's McLaren into the new turn one hairpin and where he spun and took out Coulthard in the process.

The mistake earned the Williams driver the wrath of the Scot who said: "It's no surprise that Montoya doesn't win too many races, he was all over the place. He was an accident waiting to happen."

Their places were inherited by Kimi Raikkonen and Jenson Button of Renault.

Raikkonen eventually made his way past Ralf Schumacher to steal third but Button held station at fifth and the final points position was taken by Sauber's Felippe Massa.

For Jordan, it was a day of dismay as, after three fifth-place points-finishes in a row, their luck turned sour. Into turn one at the start, Giancarlo Fisichella - who ill with flu and a temperature, had qualified a lowly 18th - missed his braking point and smacked into his own team-mate, Takuma Sato, a reversal of the silly collision instigated by Sato in Malaysia in March.

Fisichella was forced to retire on lap 28 with the damage too great to get anything more from the car. Sato raced on at the back of the field, eventually finishing 16th and last.