Bernie Collins thinks F1 team will be ‘questioning’ driver line-up call made in 2024

Follow us on Google Discover

One Formula 1 team may already be wondering if they’ve made the right decision over their driver line-up, Sky Sports F1 pundit Bernie Collins says.

The grid could be set for one of the biggest reshuffles in years for 2025, with more than half the drivers out of contract.

And Collins, who was speaking on the Sky F1 podcast, reckons one team should be having second thoughts about their pairing.

The headline move may already have taken place, with Lewis Hamilton leaving Mercedes to join Ferrari.

The Scuderia made that deal official in February and it could trigger a significant domino effect.

First and foremost, it leaves Australian Grand Prix winner Carlos Sainz without a seat, and Mercedes without a driver.

Elsewhere, Red Bull driver Sergio Perez is approaching the end of his deal, and the future of teammate and world champion Max Verstappen is uncertain amid interest from Mercedes and Aston Martin.

Bernie Collins says Ferrari may regret dropping Carlos Sainz for Lewis Hamilton

Discussing the future of Sainz, Collins suggested that ‘every team’ with a vacancy will be keen to sign him.

And she posited the ‘bold’ idea that Ferrari should be ‘questioning’ their decision to axe Sainz in favour of Hamilton.

She said: “I think every team should want to take him, and I think Ferrari should maybe be questioning if they’ve done the right thing. Maybe that’s too bold a question to pose.”

Seven-time world champion Hamilton is the most successful driver in F1 history, with a record 103 wins and 104 pole positions under his belt.

However, he’s failed to finish in the top six at any of the first three races for the first time in his 17-year F1 career.

Having come home seventh and ninth at the first two events, the Briton retired with an engine failure in Australia.

Mercedes have struggled at the start of the new season but George Russell has out-qualified Hamilton at the first three rounds.

The former Williams driver has also amassed 18 of the team’s 26 points to date, though he did crash out in the closing stages last weekend in an incident that saw Fernando Alonso penalised.

How many race wins does Carlos Sainz have?

Sainz has now won three Grands Prix after his triumph at Albert Park, and all of those have come at Ferrari.

He claimed his maiden career victory at the British Grand Prix in 2022 ahead of Perez and Hamilton.

Last year, he was the only non-Red Bull driver to win as he held off Lando Norris and the Mercedes drivers to triumph in Singapore.

Heading to Melbourne, Verstappen was looking to equal his own record of 10 wins in a row.

But just as he stopped the Dutchman making it 11 last year, he halted that stretch in Australia after the Red Bull ran into mechanical trouble.

The Bulls have won 24 of the last 26 races going back to the end of the 2022, with Sainz the only driver to deny them in that period.

He’s now equalled the likes of Giancarlo Fisichella and Johnny Herbert on the all-time list, and he needs one more to match Eddie Irvine and Bruce McLaren.