By Tom Fordyce BBC Sport Online

Compare the feeling you had after watching Ernie Els win the Open with those on seeing Michael Schumacher seal his fifth driver's world championship.

Most of us greeted Els' triumph with a smile. Apart from being one of the most likeable men in his sport, the South African had also reminded us that someone apart from Tiger could take a Major.

And Schumacher? There's admiration, certainly, and respect for dragging Ferrari from the wilderness to three successive world titles.

Els says he is ready to challenge Tiger after Muirfield

But while Muirfield made you look forward to the US PGA championship with lip-smacking relish, the result at Magny-Cours left the remaining six Grands Prix of the season looking as appetising as cold curry.

Schumacher's dull dominance has taken the spice from his sport.

You can't blame the man himself - his aim is to win every race he takes part in - but television audiences are drifting away.

In an industry where million-pound endorsements rule, that's bad news.

Formula One chiefs like to bracket their product with football as the only two truly global sports.

But when the average Champions League game attracts around seven million viewers in Britain, compared to three-and-a-half million for the French Grand Prix, the sponsors start to ask questions.

It need not be this way. Motor racing per se is no less interesting than it was before Schumacher came along.

But whereas the dominant team of the late 1980s, McLaren, had Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost racing neck and neck, Ferrari's star man is out in front by himself.

And while he continues to stay there, fickle sports fans will continue to look elsewhere for their fix of thrills and spills.

We can all applaud the dedication, intrinsic talent and rarefied skill of a world-beater like Schumacher, Tiger Woods or Pete Sampras.

But the real pleasure comes from seeing two ultra-competitive rivals taking each other on over a season or more, neither giving an inch, ideally arch-enemies away from the track or pitch.

Do you care much about middle-distance running? Probably not. But when Sebastian Coe and Steve Ovett were battling it out over 800m and 1500m, the world was rapt.

Coe's rivalry with Ovett and Cram dominated the sporting headlines

Tennis owed its growth in popularity in the late 1970s and early 1980s to the clash between the icy cool of Bjorn Borg and John McEnroe's pyrotechnics.

For the neutral, the English Premiership is better for Arsenal's title last season. Trophy after trophy going to Old Trafford meant sweet dreams for Sir Alex but brought yawns from the rest of us.

And British athletics is banking on the rivalry between 100m stars Dwain Chambers and Mark Lewis-Francis to take the sport back into the headlines.

Legends versus the living

It's why the old chestnut of comparing the best from the modern era with the former kings of the hill remains such a popular topic for media debate.

Everyone, even Juan Pablo Montoya's biggest fan, accepts that Schumacher is the best driver in Formula One.

But how would the German have got on against Fangio or Clark at their best?

Senna's untimely death denied us the chance to witness what promised to be a rivalry to fire up a new golden era for Formula One.

And unless Ferrari lose the blueprint or Schumacher misplaces his ambition, motor racing may find one driver's brilliance is not enough to keep the grandstands full.