Andrea Stella makes Max Verstappen comment after Oscar Piastri is penalised at the British Grand Prix

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Oscar Piastri was denied a sixth victory of the Formula 1 season at the British Grand Prix after being penalised for a safety car infringement.

After Max Verstappen complained about his actions at the end of the third and final safety car around halfway through the race, Piastri was placed under investigation.

Following further conversation with his McLaren team, the stewards decided to award the Aussie a 10-second time penalty for the matter.

It seemed like quite a hard punishment at the time, and it had a great effect on the outcome of the British Grand Prix, with Lando Norris getting past his teammate after late pit stops and storming to victory.

Sam Bird thinks Max Verstappen made it look ‘dangerous’ on purpose because he knew that he didn’t have a fast enough car to win.

F1 fans said the same thing after Piastri’s Norris request and couldn’t understand why he wanted his teammate to give up a victory on home soil for a penalty decision that didn’t concern him. Swapping places would not have been fair.

READ MORE: Oscar Piastri final radio message at the British Grand Prix highlights just how angry he was at Silverstone

Andrea Stella hints Max Verstappen made Oscar Piastri’s actions look ‘worse’ at the British Grand Prix

While Piastri still leads the drivers’ championship by eight points over Norris, it will still feel like a missed opportunity.

Norris made a ‘stressful’ comment about Piastri and was still wary of the pressure applied by an upset version of the 23-year-old in the closing laps.

For the first time this season, the Briton won back-to-back races and is really starting to build some momentum at an important time. Heading into the summer break, he’s on the front foot.

McLaren boss Andrea Stella seemed to indicate after the race that Verstappen had made Piastri’s braking manoeuvre look exaggerated, resulting in the penalty.

“We’ll have to see also if other competitors kind of made the situation look worse than what it is,” he told the media, according to RaceFans.

“Because we know that as part of the race-craft, some competitors definitely have the ability to make others look like they are causing severe infringement when they are not.”

READ MORE: Lando Norris pinpoints the area where Oscar Piastri has reached ‘the highest level’ amid McLaren title duel

Why David Coulthard believes Lando Norris has a crucial advantage over Oscar Piastri

We’re now exactly halfway through the Formula 1 season, and there’s plenty left to play for over the rest of the year.

McLaren have claimed nine of the 12 wins on offer, but look as dominant as they have been all season currently, with big winning margins in Spielberg and Silverstone.

Norris has a crucial advantage over Piastri, according to ex-McLaren driver David Coulthard, who believes that the former is quicker in qualifying.

With just one race before the summer break, Norris winning ahead of Piastri at the upcoming Belgian Grand Prix would see them enter the mid-season shutdown just one point apart.

The championship battle couldn’t be set up anymore tantalisingly for fans, who are in for a treat for the rest of the campaign.