Mercedes hit back at Ecclestone accusations

Mercedes has hit back at Bernie Ecclestone's claim the German car manufacturer is killing Formula 1, after the F1 supremo made comments claiming that as he tries to fix the controversial engine regulations, dominant F1 team is playing a spoiling role.

But Niki Lauda, the Mercedes team chairman, takes issue with Ecclestone's view, "We agreed to the token rule about developing in the season."

"We gave the green light so that Honda gets the average number of tokens of the other three (suppliers)," Lauda told Auto Motor und Sport.

"And we would also not be opposed to extending the engine allocation from four to five. That is even though all three measures are against our interests. So I don't think Bernie can really accuse us of blocking everything," he insisted.