Was the Verstappen/Norris clash blown out of proportion?

Time heals all wounds, or so they say. Lando Norris’ comments made in the aftermath of his Austrian Grand Prix race-deciding incident with Max Verstappen were considerably stronger versus his reaction a few days later, made with the benefit of hindsight and distance from the event itself.

Let’s compare them. Among the adjectives that Norris used in Austria were “reckless” and “desperate”, aimed at Verstappen’s robust efforts to retain the lead into Turn 3. The Briton told Sky that “if he says he did nothing wrong, then I will lose a lot of respect for that”, clearly feeling that his friend and rival was wholly to blame for the clash.

Four days later, Norris has had a partial change of heart. There were still reservations in his later dissection of the incident, largely centred on the idea of moving under braking, but Norris now feels that the clash was a result of ‘close to the edge’ racing rather than of transgressing the limits.

“I honestly don’t think he needed to apologise, some of the things I said in the pen after the race were more just because I was frustrated at the time,” Norris reviewed.

“A lot of adrenaline, a lot of emotions, and I probably said some things I didn’t believe in, especially later on in the week.

“It was a pretty pathetic incident in terms of what ended both our races, it wasn’t like an obvious bit of contact. It was probably one of the smallest bits of contact you could have, but with a pretty terrible consequence for both of us, especially for myself.

“As a review, a good race, at times very close to the edge, but we’ve spoken about it, and we’re both happy to go racing again.”

Having initially contended that he was out of room on the edge of the track, Norris later reckoned that he could have taken a touch more margin over the kerb on the left to avoid the incident, but contended that “there’s things from both sides that I’m sure we wanted to do better, in a slightly different way.”

Whenever there’s a high-profile incident on track, particularly in the wake of two drivers locking horns in the fight for a victory, a frenzy across all outlets will undoubtedly follow. It lends credence to the cryptic communique issued in 1995 by Eric Cantona, who responded to a successful appeal against a brief prison sentence for kicking a supporter thusly: “When seagulls follow the trawler, it is because they think sardines will…