Helmut Marko calls Max Verstappen anger 'justified' in fresh swipe at Red Bull team

Max Verstappen's anger is "justified", according to Helmut Marko, with the Red Bull advisor taking aim at the team's strategists. The opening race of the season looked set to be a straight fight between Red Bull and Ferrari with Mercedes trailing their main rivals.

And, for most of the race, that proved to be the case with Charles Leclerc jostling with Verstappen for top spot. Midway through the race, it looked as though Verstappen was going to get the better of Leclerc on track.

Red Bull had brought Leclerc in for the undercut and it almost paid off with Leclerc coming in a lap later and battling to stay in front of Verstappen. The Ferrari driver managed to hold off the threat from the reigning F1 world champion though and eventually went on to win his first race since 2019.

But the end of the race proved to be a disaster for Red Bull as reliability issues saw both Verstappen and Sergio Perez forced to retire from the race. Verstappen angrily stated after the race that mechanical issues "shouldn't happen" at the highest level in a dig at Red Bull.

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And Marko has sided with Verstappen, although he angled his view more on Red Bull's strategists for not giving the 2022 F1 champion more freedom to push harder on the undercut.

"That wasn't our day, because it was also a misjudgment in terms of strategy: Max's outlap was slow to protect the tires," he told F1-Insider. "We underestimated the undercut. We thought we were clearly behind, but that wasn't the case.

"Had he been driving at a normal pace, he would have been in front and could have regulated and controlled everything much more easily. That's why Max's anger is justified."

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