Mercedes' Wolff counters Vettel 'unfair' criticism

Mercedes boss Toto Wolff has stepped up to defend Sebastian Vettel against the strong criticism directed lately towards the Ferrari driver.

Vettel has come under fire from pundits and Italy's partisan media who believe the four-time world champion is just committing too many mistakes to beat arch-rival Lewis Hamilton to the title this year, despite the fact that he is being supplied with a superior car.

"I'm not completely neutral, but for me Lewis is the best driver of recent years," Wolff told Die Welt newspaper.

"Even so, I find the criticism of Sebastian not quite fair.

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"If possible to win, he has the ambition to do it with the necessary aggression," said the Austrian.

"That requires a lot of courage and his way of driving sometimes leads to collisions. But let's not forget that he won four world championships. As I do with Lewis, you have to accept that."

Wolff believes there's a small margin between triumph and disaster, insisting Vettel's mistake on the first lap of last Sunday's Italian Grand Prix could have also led to Hamilton's demise.

"It could easily have been Lewis instead of Sebastian who spun, then the whole Grand Prix would have been different," said Wolff.

"In the high tech world of Formula 1, everything is not decided linearly and rationally, but also with luck, misfortune and coincidence."

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