Mercedes desperate to make Max Verstappen eat his words over Lewis Hamilton 'luck' jibe

Mercedes are determined to make Max Verstappen eat his words. In an interview with CarNext, Verstappen appeared to take a thinly-veiled dig at the achievements of Lewis Hamilton, who has won six titles with the silver arrows.

"You need a bit of luck to fight for seven or eight [titles]," Verstappen said.

"You need a very dominant team as well to do that so you don't always have that luck or you are not in that era."

In light of the champion's comments, Mercedes technical director James Allison says the silver arrows are determined to prove their dominance has not been "lucky".

"It's not unique to Mercedes to be excited about the regulation set but it is something I can speak of with personal experience that we do love it when new regulations come along," he said in a Mercedes preview video for 2022.

"We see it as an opportunity that we haven't just been lucky over the years, we haven't merely stumbled into a formula and a God-given right to be dominant all these last seasons.

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"We see every single regulation change as an opportunity to pit our wits against them and see whether we deserve to be competitive against them, to see whether or not we can show afresh that we've understood the physics behind the car.

"We've just tried to translate that into designs and concepts, realising in manufacturing, and then deliver to the track in a way that allows us to be competitive once more."

This was not the first time the 24-year-old made comments about his rival's success.

Back in November 2020 that Verstappen appeared resentful towards the Mercedes mechanics, pushing the notion that their car is significantly superior to the rest of