BUTTON PRESSES CASE FOR RUSSELL
BRIT ‘SHOULD PARTNER LEWIS’
JENSON BUTTON says George Russell should form an all-British line-up with Lewis Hamilton next season at Mercedes.
Former world champion Button is an adviser to the Williams team for whom Russell is driving.
But he believes Russell is the “best option” on the grid for Mercedes, with Valtteri Bottas looking likely to lose the seat for 2022.
Mercedes called up Russell, 23, last season when Hamilton was forced to miss the Sakhir Grand Prix in Bahrain, and he nearly won the race.
Button said: “Even though I’m a senior adviser at Williams, I have to say the best option [for Mercedes] is George.”
Bottas admitted ahead of tomorrow’s French Grand Prix that conversations had yet to start with Mercedes regarding 2022 – with Russell adding he was keen to secure his future in F1 by the summer break.
Russell’s contract with Williams expires at the end of this season too and Button added: “I know they’d love to keep George because he is a great talent.
“He’s not just fast, but he works really hard, which is good to see.
“And he’s very confident in his own ability, which he should be.”
Button, the 2009 world champion, admits Bottas is not helping his own situation. “We all have a bad race now and again,” he said. “But it seems to be mostly bad races so far this year. It’s been a really, really tough year for him.
“And maybe he’s had bad races previously, but we’ve not seen it because the Mercedes has been so far out front.
“You can be 10 seconds behind your team-mate or 20 seconds behind your team-mate, and you can still finish second, whereas now they’re in the fight a little bit more with other teams. “Valtteri was bringing home a lot of points in the constructors’ race, whereas now he’s not bringing up a lot of points, it’s actually Red Bull that has the second driver that’s doing really well. They have to ask if they need to look at other options for next year, I think. ” Jenson Button is fronting Readly’s ‘Step back in time’ retro campaign. Readly is offering two months free unlimited reading to over 5,000 magazines and republished retro issues from June 22 until September 30 2021, then £7.99 a month thereafter. Visit www.readly.com/ motorsport21