Hamilton: George and I still have a great relationship

Roaring into Turn 1, attacking pole position man Max Verstappen, Hamilton went wide, and cut into the path of Russell, the contact caused the #44 Mercedes to end up beached in the sane, an instant DNF.

Russell on the other hand, managed to make it to the pits for repairs and thereafter proceeded to deliver one of his best drives to finish fourth, while Hamilton watched on the Telly.

Initially, Hamilton blurted out over the radio: "Yeah I got taken out by my own team-mate." But clearly he was wrong and realised as much afterwards, and took the blame.

Then, perhaps to pour cold water on speculation that the incident could be divisive, Hamilton told Sky Italia: "I think we are a great team. George and I still have a great relationship. We will discuss things and work away.

"I'm happy to take responsibility as the older guy. I don't think George had anywhere to go at that point. I was trying to get ahead of both of them and just an unfortunate situation. I had the worst tyre of everyone around me, so I needed to try and get ahead. Big risk, big penalty," explained the seven-time F1 World champion.

As for the vibes between him and Russell after another coming together between the pair, Hamilton added: "The relationship isn't broken. I don't have any problems with George, we have a great relationship, we work and we always talk about things.

"So this is definitely unfortunate and I'm sure he was frustrated at the moment like I was. But we will talk about it offline and we move forward. As I said, apologies to all of the team."

With team boss Toto Wolff absent in Qatar, Mercedes communications boss Bradley Lord, speaking to Sky F1 after the race at Lusail, explained: "We discussed it in the morning. It was a scenario we had been through and different start tyre performance and things like that. Then, in the moment, they all just ran out of space. George obviously had nowhere to go, Lewis tried to take his line and we saw what happened.

"Unfortunately, these things can happen and you can't programme everything, even with a discussion beforehand. We will talk about it afterwards, as we do, and go through it and learn what we can to hopefully never have it happen again."

"On Lap 1 with George at the back and Lewis in the gravel," recalled Lord. "Things didn't look brilliant at all. To turn that around with George in P4 and outscoring Ferrari on an afternoon was not something we could have hoped for once we were one lap into the race.

"What might have been is clear to see. We were right on the pace of the McLarens, probably not within striking distance of Max, but there's a double podium that could have been. Ifs, buts and maybes don't really count in this sport, so we will take what we have got and be happy with that, but it could have been so much more," lamented Lord.

History shows that Hamilton and Russell can be suspect when it comes to wheel-to-wheel racing, and close combat on track. That they take each other out is a big NO-NO for Mercedes, prompting the question: How will they behave when they have a race-winning car, with space for only one driver on the top step of the F1 podium?

Keep in mind that beating your teammate, by as much as possible all the time, is the unique priority for an F1 driver...