Gasly: Alonso even more aggressive than he used to be

Speaking to reporters after the race, Gasly gave his side of the story regarding the on-track altercation with Alonso, "Basically we came up after the Safety Car into turn one side by side and I went on the outside and he pushed me completely out of the track."

"I tried to stay on track as much as I could but he just didn’t leave me space so I had to jump over the kerb and then he also touched me and completely damaged all the right side of my floor."

“From there on, I think it was lap eight or something my car was completely broken and I was sliding everywhere," explained the 22-year-old who soldiered on to finish 15th while Alonso was forced to park his McLaren with an electronics issue on lap nine.

Regarding his clash with the McLaren veteran, Gasly added, “I think for sure his outlook is a bit different because he knows he’s not going to be in Formula 1 anymore next year so it looks like he is even more aggressive than he used to be.”

“For me what he did was unfair and we know that if you are alongside you need to give the space of one car and today he didn’t. I know he doesn’t like us because we have the Honda engine but nevertheless.

“I think it’s not something to talk together but I’m not the kind of guy to make a big story out of things. If I have something to say I’ll tell him face-to-face," insisted Gasly.

A day earlier, during qualifying, Alonso was involved in another spat with Haas driver Kevin Magnussen, the pair tangling in the exact same place - Turn 1 aka Variante Rettifilo - which compromised both their final runs in Q2.

After the incident on Saturday, Magnussen told reporters that he could not wait for Alonso to retire from F1, which will happen on 25 November when the Spaniard climbs out of the McLaren at the end of the season finale in Abu Dhabi.