Daniel Ricciardo is contracted for next year, but McLaren boss Zak Brown made it clear that both parties have escape clauses.
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Daniel Ricciardo finished 13th at the Monaco Grand Prix after crashing in P2. The McLaren chief executive Zak Brown was not very happy with the results and opined that the Australian driver was not meeting the team’s expectations. Ignoring the feeling is becoming increasingly difficult. Undoubtedly everyone felt it as well, amid the escalating rumors and more harsh punditry. Daniel Ricciardo’s spell with McLaren seems over, with the team preparing the media for an axing.
The 32-year-old Mclaren driver is contracted for next year, but McLaren boss Zak Brown made it clear on the weekend that both parties have escape clauses. “I don’t want to get into the contract, but there are mechanisms in which we’re committed to each other, and mechanisms in which we’re not,” Brown said about 2023. I spoke with Daniel about it. We’re not getting the results that we both hoped for, but we’re both going to continue to push.” stated Brown.
Obviously, F1 is volatile, and there are certain guarantees that teams just cannot provide, such as competitiveness. Ricciardo agreed to terms at the conclusion of the 2020 season with no assurances of success. Ricciardo recalled a year ago how the driver he replaced at McLaren, Carlos Sainz, asked him how he was adjusting to the strange car. “And I was like, ‘Thanks for telling me!’” Ricciardo says on a lighter note. Like many jokes, one feels as if there was an element of truth behind it.
Read more: McLaren have right people tied down for the long term: Zak Brown
Former Formula One World Champion Jacques Villeneuve believes that the Australian driver has been an expensive mistake who has not yielded any value for McLaren. “Ultimately, he (Ricciardo) has been a highly-paid driver who has cost the team a lot of money. He doesn’t bring in any points and he doesn’t have the speed the team needs to develop the car. So he’s just costing them money. It would be cheaper for them to continue paying Ricciardo’s salary, let him sit on the couch at home, and put another driver in the car. It’s a harsh reality, but that’s Formula 1.”
Now will the Australian driver continue with the British team and serve his contract to entirety only time will tell, the next race in the F1 calendar is the Azerbaijan Grand Prix on June 12.
