'Messy situation' - Toto Wolff fears Lewis Hamilton vs Max Verstappen will be decided by another crash

ByAlexander Netherton

Updated 07/12/2021 at 10:05 GMT

After a Saudi Arabian Grand Prix that was full of drama and rancour between Red Bull's Max Verstappen and Mercedes' Lewis Hamilton, Hamilton's team principal, Austrian Toto Wolff, has said he fears that the drivers' championship could be decided by another collision between the duelling pair this weekend.

Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff says he is worried that the F1 drivers’ championship will be decided by a crash between title rivals Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton.

During the penultimate race of the season in Saudi Arabia, the pair collided once on a straight in controversial circumstances, and Verstappen also cut across Hamilton twice in relatively risky moves.

Verstappen suffered penalties and requests from the director and his own team to give up places, which led to him complaining at the end of the race that, 'this is not Formula 1.'

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The pair of them have 369.5 points each in the championship, but Verstappen has more wins over the season which puts him ahead in a tie-break situation. That would mean that should neither of them finish the race on Sunday in Abu Dhabi, the Dutchman would win the championship.

That recalls situations in F1 seasons past, where Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost collided in the heat of battle, and also a similar situation with Damon Hill and Michael Schumacher.

Speaking ahead of the weekend’s finale, Wolff said “I would hope that [Sunday’s] race has enough repercussions that everybody’s going to learn from it and adapt for the final race,

“Similar driving, if it were to be deemed by the stewards as over the line, would then probably also be penalised in Abu Dhabi, and that could well end in a messy situation for everybody. I don’t think that the championship has deserved a result which was influenced by a collision.

“The emotions are running very, very high,” he continued. “As long as we have a clean race fighting for the drivers’ world championship in Abu Dhabi, it was a great season.”

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