Brundle: McLaren Monza team orders the right thing to do

Lando Norris was the leading McLaren driver when the team decided to stop their drivers for fresh rubber, but they decided to pit Oscar Piastri first to cover off Charles Leclerc in the Ferrari.

While Piastri had a smooth 1.9s stop, Norris had an issue with his front left tyre, which meant he ended up behind his teammate when both rejoined the track, which prompted McLaren to order the Australian to give the position back to the Briton.

With Norris and Piastri fighting so closely for the F1 Drivers' Championship this season, such a decision by McLaren may have serious implications on the outcome of the fight towards the end of the campaign, and while many have criticized the decision, Brundle believed the Woking squad have done the right thing.

In his post-Italian Grand Prix column on Sky Sports F1, Brundle wrote of the situation the reigning F1 Constructors' Champions had to deal with.

"McLaren now had a problem," he wrote. "The team had swapped pit stops around and hurt Norris through no fault of his own other than being compliant with a team request. That 1.9-second stop could and should have been his normally.

"They asked Piastri to yield and swap positions. He was unsurprisingly reluctant, as that's a six-point swing in the championship battle with Norris.

"But he complied, and I believe that was the right thing to do all round, as happened in reverse in Hungary last year," he added, referring to the 2024 Hungarian Grand Prix when McLaren ordered Norris to swap positions with Piastri, who was leading but lost out in the pit stops.

Brundle then continued his justification: "If Norris had, for example, run long in his stop and scattered his mechanics, or it had simply been a slow stop, then that's the way the cookie crumbles.

"But there were a number of aspects to this scenario, including prior discussions and agreements," he pointed out. "The cohesion of this team is what's making it so dominant this season, and both drivers are smart enough to realize that for both now and into the future.

"Don't judge either of them for playing the team game; all the other teams on the grid would kill to have two great drivers working in tandem for the good of the team like this, while also racing the wheels off the cars and doing their best to beat each other.

"At least Piastri did gain the advantage of now being in Norris' DRS rear wing open range, but Norris continued to have the pace," Brundle concluded.

McLaren did inform Piastri that he could attack Norris after swapping, but the latter had enough pace to hold on to second place in the end.