That, altogether might NOT be entirely true... Almost ten years ago Swindon was developing and developed 2.0 litre Formula 3 engine based on Zetec -SE puma engine. IIRC, they bored it out quite a bit (only 4 mm between cilinders?).
They, AFAIK didn't manage to make a business case out of everything against Mugen-Hondas of that time, but the engine itself was competitive. What would be durability of such engine in everyday use is beyond me, but the engine itself was enlarged to two litre volume.....