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F1 pundit Natalie Pinkham feels if Sergio Perez cannot hold on to P2 in the championship this season then he should get fired by Red Bull.
The Mexican's season started impressively when he won two out of the first four races in Jeddah and Baku. Since Miami, however, the season has taken a turn for the worse.
The Red Bull driver has not won another race since Baku and his performances have nosedived significantly. During this time, Max Verstappen has been on an unbeaten run and has won eight races in succession.
Talking about the second half of the season in the latest Sky Sports podcast, Natalie Pinkham was predicting who would finish second in the championship behind Max.
In what was a surprising and controversial pick, she went with Lewis Hamilton, however, she also added the caveat that if Sergio Perez cannot finish P2 this season, he should be replaced by Red Bull.
“It’s controversial, but I’m going to say that Lewis Hamilton will finish runner-up. The reason I say that is because I fear that the Aston Martin decent run form is over, whether it is to do with this flexi wing being outruled [sic] or whether they’ve just gone down a bit of a cul de sac in terms of development and it’s been exaggerated by the fact that others have gone well, the likes of McLaren," Pinkham said.
She added:
“But I will caveat that with saying that if Perez doesn’t finish runner up, he should lose his seat – because this [car] is an unbelievable piece of machinery. And I do believe that Perez has the ability, the talent to do it, so if he doesn’t then I’m afraid that is the end of his career at Red Bull. So I think probably Perez will do it, because he has the talent and the car to do it, but I’m just being controversial.”
Could Sergio Perez lose out to Lewis Hamilton for P2 in the championship?
Looking at the point standings, Sergio Perez has 189 points while Lewis Hamilton has 148 points to his name. At face value, the gap between the two drivers is only 41 points, however, that kind of gap is huge by all means.
We need to keep in mind that the car underneath Sergio Perez is at least a step ahead of the Mercedes that Lewis Hamilton drives. Could the F1 legend get it done by the end of the season? It is a possibility for sure.
