“Things are not going to get better for Valtteri Bottas,” claims former F1 champion

“Things are not going to get better for Valtteri Bottas,” claims former F1 champion

Valtteri Bottas

Valtteri Bottas has endured a turbulent start to the 2021 season. The Mercedes driver failed to challenge for the victory at the Bahrain GP, after a pit-stop mishap. Things took a turn for the worse, as he did not manage to finish the Imola GP, after a collision with George Russell.

Mercedes boss, Toto Wolff blamed George Russell for the incident, and even jokingly threatened to demote Mercedes reserve driver. However, former F1 champion, Jacques Villeneuve believes that Bottas was to blame himself, as he was not fast enough on Sunday.

“I don’t quite understand Toto Wolff,” Jacques Villeneuve told F1-Insider.com. “Why does he blame the young Brit in the collision with Mercedes junior Russell? Bottas knew exactly that his potential successor was about to overtake him and risked a serious accident with his short move to the right,” he added.

“He mustn’t do that under these difficult track conditions. But this shows how tense Bottas is already in the second race of the season. And that’s not going to get any better. Because he is simply too slow. If he wasn’t, he wouldn’t have had to defend his position so over-hard against a Williams,” the former driver continued.

Sergio Perez is stronger than Bottas: Villeneuve

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The former driver believes that although, Sergio Perez is getting used to his Red Bull car, yet he looks much stronger than Valtteri Bottas. The Mexican took the second spot in the qualifying of the Imola GP, but a late error cost him some precious points, as he managed to finish P11.

However, Villeneuve believes that Perez can help his teammate Max Verstappen in a better way as compared to Bottas supporting Lewis Hamilton.

“Perez is the newcomer to the Red Bull team and yet is already stronger than Bottas, who is in his fifth season with Mercedes. Perez can help Max more than Bottas can do for Hamilton,” Villeneuve stated.

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