Mercedes on the back foot for a change

It will be interesting to see how the Silver Arrows bosses react to fresh threat

Looking at the bare statistics, it would have been hard to back against Lewis Hamilton strutting his stuff in Montreal last weekend. He has had so many superb performances at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve that he looked irresistible. How wrong we were.

Toto Wolff has pressed the panic button, describing it as “a sh*t weekend” for the team - even though Valtteri Bottas managed to collect second place behind the Ferrari of Sebastian Vettel. We could be about to see a new side to the team, the outfit which has been the benchmark for so long. Now the pressure is on, and it has been ramped up to such a degree that it is not something that the team has experienced in recent times.

The true identity of teams can be seen in how they react to defeat, and not how they bask in glory when they win. The chips are down for Mercedes now, and how it performs from here on in will be very interesting to see. Lewis Hamilton has hinted that he thinks Ferrari will crack as the season reaches its summit. That might be true but if it doesn’t, then the next few months will be very interesting ones for those employed at Merc’s Brackley HQ. Matt James, Editor (Twitter: @Mattjmnews)