Max Verstappen believes George Russell would make life “very difficult” for Lewis Hamilton if he is promoted to a Mercedes seat in 2022.
Russell has been heavily linked to a Mercedes seat next year having spent the first three seasons of his Formula 1 career with Williams.
Mercedes has had a relatively smooth time off-track with a pairing of Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas, having had to juggle an increasingly fraught relationship between Hamilton and Nico Rosberg.
“If he joins then for sure he will make it very difficult for Lewis,” said Verstappen.
Russell is odds on favourite for the seat according to bookmakers. Find out how do getting odds work.
“He jumped into the car in Bahrain and basically from the first lap he was making it very difficult for Valtteri so you can only imagine the more experience you gain in that car and the more you get accustomed within the team, naturally you’re going to get faster.
“When you do your first race you’re guided by the team about setup direction because you just don’t know what to do really, initially, with the car.
“I remember my first race at Red Bull. The thing I said was is that we will just follow a bit what Daniel [Ricciardo] is doing because I have no clue about what this car needs to go quick because even though F1 cars look pretty similar, the way of setting them up can be very different.
“Already what you could see with the performance he did in Spa was really good.
“Of course, they set up the car a bit more for wet conditions but nevertheless to do that in a Williams was very impressive. I do expect him to do very well if he gets that seat.”
