Herbert: Verstappen starting to lose respect for Red Bull

The situation within Red Bull is not healthy to say the least. The team didn't seem to recover following Christian Horner's sexting scandal at the start of the 2024 F1 season, as a mini-civil war followed that involved in addition to Verstappen, his father Jos and Dr. Helmut Marko along with the top management in the Red Bull board.

After that, news about Verstappen planning to leave started to gain momentum and after that Adrian Newey resigned, and as the team are struggling to fend off the challenges of McLaren and Mercedes recently, their long-serving Sporting Director Jonathan Wheatley left them to become Team Principal of Audi F1.

Verstappen has not been a happy bunny of late, his rants over the team radio in the Hungarian GP well documented, and while he was more calm in the Belgian GP, he can't be happy to miss out on a podium finish following an engine penalty which meant he started the race from 11th after posting the fastest time in qualifying.

Speaking to TopOffShoreSportsBooks.com, Hebert commented on the Red Bull situation, he said: "I can see Red Bull starting to unravel.

"We all see the performances of McLaren and Mercedes doing a brilliant job coming from the relative back of the pack to winning races. Red Bull have still got a quick car but in a race scenario they were on the back foot.

"It is very hard to turnaround a situation that Red Bull find themselves within a season where they have gone from dominating to struggling to make the podium.

"Max and Jos have said that they will be looking towards 2026," the Briton went on. "Where would they be looking? There's only one place really, and that is Mercedes. Toto Wolff is desperate to get Max on the books. The stars are aligning for a move there."

Herbert went even further claiming: "Max sounds like a driver who is starting to lose respect for Red Bull. He is making a few mistakes. The car is not performing like it was. His frustrations come out for the world to hear.

"I like drivers who show passion! It is a pressure though he can carry going forward. That is what the best in sport can do, deploy a winning mentality," he concluded.