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Verstappen expects to be allowed to race Ricciardo in future

Max Verstappen expects to be allowed to race Daniel Ricciardo in the future as a result of their clean battle in the Malaysian Grand Prix.

The two Red Bull drivers were scrapping over second place in the race shortly before Lewis Hamilton retired, with the pair racing closely though the high-speed section of turns 5 and 6 as Ricciardo just came out ahead. Asked if it was good that Red Bull allowed the pair of them to fight on track, Verstappen replied: "Yeah for sure.

"I think we showed the team we could do it in a very respectful way, and I think that shows for the future a lot of confidence.

"It was more into Turn 6 I was like, if it was someone else next to me then I would have got the move done, I would have pushed them wide, but it’s your team-mate you can’t."

Asked if he felt Red Bull should have told Ricciardo to let him by when he was on newer tyres and chasing down Hamilton, Verstappen replied: "No because at the time it was not very clear if Daniel was going to stay out or not.

"Of course the virtual safety car made it clear, OK, now we both pit, before that we were racing for positions. I was definitely going to the end, with Daniel’s car they were not fully sure, so it’s a bit difficult for them to say to Daniel to let me go by."

And Verstappen says he was not too angry to miss out on victory having looked the quicker car before Hamilton retired, with the resulting Virtual Safety Car allowing both Red Bulls to fit fresh tyres.

"No frustrations, you have to see the positive side and I think the whole weekend was very strong. The pace was there, just a bit unfortunate with the last virtual safety car but that’s racing, sometimes it doesn’t go your way. I still have a lot of years ahead of me so I shouldn’t be complaining about this single race."

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.