"Disqualify George Russell": Fans react to Mercedes drivers clashing in 2023 F1 Spanish GP qualifying

F1 fans called for Mercedes driver George Russell to be disqualified from the Spanish Grand Prix after he collided with teammate Lewis Hamilton during the qualifying session on Saturday (June 3).

In his bid to get out of the Q2 session, Russell collided with his teammate and interrupted his fast run in the final moments of the session, which resulted in damage to his car from Hamilton and vice versa. Although, both drivers stated that there was a lack of communication from the team.

In his post-race interview, George Russell said:

"It was just a massive miscommunication. I was looking ahead trying to get the slipstream from Carlos and the next thing, Lewis was there, so we need to talk internally about how that happened because between two teammates, it never should."

"It was neither [driver] fault. Nothing by either driver was necessarily wrong, just within the team, it shouldn't happen and the communication should be better."

F1 fans on social media were not satisfied with Russell's explanation with one fan claiming that he should be disqualified, writing:

"Disqualify Russell."

Here are some more reactions:

"We made some small changes from FP3 to Qualifying, and the car was bouncing" - George Russell

The Mercedes driver stated that they made some changes to the car from the final practice after the W14 was bouncing in the session. While speaking to the media, including RacingNews365, George Russell said:

"We made some small changes from FP3 to Qualifying and the car was bouncing. The high-speed corners that were easy flat in practice, I couldn't take flat, couldn't the tires work and it all went wrong."

"Back in Q1, I knew we weren't going to have a good day, it was strange. We should be capitalizing on conditions like that, we usually do - the team is very good when it is challenging.

Russell continued:

"It was pretty telling the first lap in Q1 with [Nico] Hulkenberg P1, one-a-half-seconds quicker than we could achieve. I was trying all sorts on the out-lap, all sorts of pressures and we probably just got ourselves a bit confused."

"A set-up change we made into Qualifying was definitely the wrong direction for these cold, damp, greasy conditions, which is a shame especially because I think we have a fast race car."

Starting from P12, it will be interesting to see how many positions the Mercedes driver can make in the race and score some good haul of points.