George Russell feels he would have been scapegoated for Mercedes' slump had Lewis Hamilton decided to retire after his Abu Dhabi heartbreak.
Russell impressed in his first three years as a Formula 1 driver. He secured impressive results despite often having the slowest car on the grid, and might have won on his first Mercedes debut had he not been thwarted by a team pit stop error and a puncture.
So when he got the call-up to race for Mercedes full-time, it seemed inevitable that Russell would be in the title conversation straight away. Alas, that would not be the case as his move coincided with the Silver Arrows' decline in fortunes.
The team got their car development all wrong and spent the rest of the year playing catch up. Other than a golden weekend in Brazil, when Russell secured his first F1 race win, the two Mercedes drivers had a pretty miserable time of it.
Had seven-time world champion Hamilton not been these suffering alongside him, Russell is sure that he would have been singled out for blame. "For me, being teammates with Lewis is such a golden opportunity – especially now the car isn't performing as we want," he told Square Mile.
"Having him as my team-mate has saved me in some regard, because if he had retired or left the sport when I joined the team, and we took this step backwards, people would be pointing the blame towards me!
"But I feel like now I've proven my worth and I've proven what I'm capable of, so there's no pressure in that regard. I'm out there to do the best job possible and I think that is a very fortunate position to be in."
Clearly, Russell feels prepared for what life would look like if Hamilton chose to walk away from F1. That is a possibility this year, with his current Mercedes deal expiring at the end of the season.
Renewal talks which once looked a formality have failed to materialise. Hamilton's latest update on the situation did not promise an extension, but he did pledge to stay "with Mercedes until my last days" in F1.
