Lewis Hamilton told by Sebastian Vettel: “George Russell has talent and skill to become champion”
Mercedes drivers Hamilton and Russell combined to battle their W13 car’s issues with porpoising and performance throughout a drab 2022, a year in which they were largely helpless to stop 168澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果历史:Max Verstappen winning a second consecutive F1 title.
Hamilton did not win a single race for the first time in his career, while Russell won his first-ever grand prix in Brazil. Russell, in fourth, finished ahead of Hamilton in the 168澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果历史:F1 standings and has been b🐬ullish about his own ambitions next year.
Four-time champion Vettel told Sky about Russell’s hopes: "I🌠t's so difficult to say. But if he gets the right car, the right equipment, the right team - and I think he's in a good place - then yeah I think he's got the talent and skill.
"There's more than talent and skill needed but he seems to be 🐠hard-working, so yes he👍's got a good chance."
Russell ဣwarned that he was coming to clಞaim the championship for himself.
“I feel absolutely ready to win a world championship," he told Sky in Abu Dhabi. "I've felt ready fo🔯r a couple of years now.
"I think having this season nex🦹t to Lewis has been huge for me personally to learn som🧸e of the little details, how to get more out of my car, more out of my team, and extracting everything out of the package when it truly matters.
"And I'm definitely going to have a really strong winter. I'm going to work really hard with my team. Every single person at Mer꧂cedes' factory is going to be pushing like hell to deliver a car, to give us a chance to go fight next season.
"I guess if you told me that at the start of the year, I would have been 🉐extra🐓ordinarily happy because if you beat Lewis Hamilton in a Mercedes, most of the time that means you will be a world champion.
"Obviously, I would take the pos𓂃itives away from the season, but I'm not going to celebrate finishing P4 in the championship.
"I'm go🧔ing to celebrate winning the race in Brazil because that was a huge achievement for myself and the whole team. But the fact is, we're all here to win and we're here to win world championships. So we've not done a perfect job this seasꦿon. We've had a relatively clean and smooth season with the car and package we've had.
"But to the⛄ standards this team set, some standards I set myself - it's not good enough and we need to go on next year and give it more."
James was a sports journalist at Sky S♈ports for a decade covering everything from American♛ sports, to football, to F1.
