Jacques Villeneuve says the F1 media treat Lando Norris unfairly compared to Oscar Piastri

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Oscar Piastri is in a rut. He’s only scored 32 points in the last five events – including a Sprint weekend in Austin.

Piastri’s biggest asset in the 2025 title fight had been his consistency. Prior to his nightmare Baku weekend, he’d only been outside the top four in one competitive session all season.

After crashing twice in Azerbaijan (and jumping the start), Martin Brundle says Piastri has ‘scattered his brain’. The stats have flipped – he’s without a top-four result in the last five qualifying sessions/races, a run that has seen him relinquish the championship lead to his teammate.

Previously, Lando Norris was the driver making mistakes. Errors in Bahrain left him sixth on the grid, then he crashed during Q3 in Saudi Arabia and suffered a race-ending shunt in Canada after tagging Piastri’s car.

Jacques Villeneuve says Oscar Piastri receives ‘a lot less criticism’ than Lando Norris

Speaking on Sky Sports after the Mexican GP, Jacques Villeneuve said Norris was ‘clamped’ by the F1 media after struggling to find his best form earlier in the season. They latched onto his tendency to ‘berate himself’.

Villeneuve says Norris is more measured in the media now and has moved to a ‘politically correct’ strategy of avoiding any headlines.

But the 1997 world champion believes Piastri’s drop-off has exposed a double standard. He hasn’t been ‘criticised’ in the same way despite producing McLaren’s worst run of the year.

• READ MORE: Five worst moments of Lando Norris’ F1 career including Imola heartbreak and dramatic Spa crash

“If you look at the first half of the season, he was very good at berating himself always, even too much,” said Villeneuve. “People really clamped on that, and they were starting to criticise him a lot.

“He’s really come back now and he doesn’t berate himself anymore. He’s still very politically correct in all his answers because he’s not giving us anything, but when you look at the way Piastri has crumbled, he’s not getting criticised the same way Norris has been criticised for a lot less.

“We’ll see how that pans out in the long run.”

Jacques Villeneuve needs to remember what he himself said about Lando Norris

It’s worth stressing that the erstwhile championship leader has come under heavy scrutiny. For instance, Ralf Schumacher suggested Piastri was making ‘excuses’ for not being able to match Norris.

It’s even been said that Piastri didn’t act like a ‘world champion’ by taking a conservative approach to the race in Mexico and waiting for incidents ahead to hand him opportunities.

Besides, Villeneuve should remember his own comments. Back in May, he said Norris cracks under pressure when it’s ‘money time’.

Both McLaren drivers are facing more noise than ever this season after becoming title contenders, and they may each have struggled with it at various points.