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Daniel Ricciardo believes his former teammate Max Verstappen deserved to win the 2021 F1 world championship.
The McLaren driver believes the support for Lewis Hamilton and the perceived injustice he faced at the Abu Dhabi GP doesn’t downgrade the Dutchman’s worthiness of being a world champion.
Speaking to Racing News 365 in this regard, Ricciardo said:
“Obviously there’s the Lewis side, but there shouldn’t be a ‘Max doesn’t deserve it’ side, because he absolutely also deserved it…They’ve both done phenomenal races; they both come back, and so someone was always going to lose out, I guess.”
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The Australian driver supported his former teammate, suggesting it was incorrect to question Verstappen’s world-championship credentials.
Having driven alongside the Dutchman for three years, the former Red Bull driver believes the 23-year-old deserved to be the 2021 world champion. Despite sympathising with Hamilton, Ricciardo believes it is incorrect to criticise the Red Bull champion.
The 32-year-old believes both the Dutchman and Hamilton drove phenomenally throughout the season to deserve the title.
However, the Australian feels no matter how the season finale ended, only one could have emerged a winner. Therefore, despite the unfortunate events of the Abu Dhabi GP, Ricciardo extended his support towards his former teammate.
“That was kind of, in a way, the shame with (what happened in Abu Dhabi)..There was always going to be a winner and a loser last year, no matter how the last race ended, even if it was a boring last lap finish. But they both truly deserved a title.”
Daniel Ricciardo believes Max Verstappen was always going to be a world champion
Reflecting on his years as a Red Bull driver, Ricciardo said that he thought Max Verstappen would claim the world title at some point in his career.
The Australian believes both he and Max Verstappen pushed each other to the limit, making them worthy of at least one title. Reflecting on his time as the Verstappen’s teammate, Ricciardo said:
“Being teammates with Max, I knew that we were pushing each other to a pretty high level...I knew that, whilst we were teammates, we weren’t World Champion(s); I felt like, the way we were driving, could have given us the World title, in some of those years."
"At least one. I didn’t really need to see him win the title to show that to myself. I feel like I really (have) felt that or known that for a while.. It was kind of a matter of time for him to get a title, for sure.”
From 2016 to 2018 when the Australian partnered Verstappen, Red Bull failed to provide them with a competitive package to win titles. However, on a good day, the duo posed a serious threat to world champions Nico Rosberg, Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel, who were fighting for the championship in that period.
