The Red Bull team principal, Christian Horner, has defended his driver Max Verstappen in the world champion’s increasingly ill-tempered feud with Mercedes’ George Russell and dismissed their very public falling-out as part of an end-of-year “pantomime season” before this weekend’s Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.
Verstappen has already been crowned drivers’ champion, a success overshadowed at this finale by the spat he is now embroiled in with Russell. Their altercation ramped up in Abu Dhabi when the British driver accused Verstappen of threatening to put him “on your fucking head in the wall” and that it was time someone stood up to the Dutchman’s bullying. Verstappen has denied making the threat.
