JONATHAN McEVOY on the scenario at Red Bull amid Horner textual content scandal

Max Verstappen and his father Jos sat down for dinner in Dubai final evening with lots to chew over. 

The pair flew to the land of the skyscraper from Bahrain en route, in Max’s case, to Saturday’s Saudi Arabian Grand Prix and the following instalment of Formula One’s grizzliest cleaning soap opera, a blockbuster that refuses to die.

At the centre of the plot is Christian Horner, the Red Bull crew principal who despatched suggestive textual content messages to a lady colleague. Verstappen Snr desires the 50-year-old Englishman gone, a reality he expressed in public for the primary time in these pages yesterday.

In strident temper, he declared that the crew, which is flushed with the success of 13 world championships of their 19 years of vibrant existence, would ‘explode’ until Horner strikes on. He accused him of taking part in the sufferer.

Now, you don’t should be a rocket scientist to see the potential implications in a dispute concerning the city not being sufficiently big for the 2 of them. That is the place Max, 26, and the best driver of his time, and presumably of any time, comes into it.

Embattled Red Bull crew principal Christian Horner was joined by his spouse, Geri, in Bahrain

Jos Verstappen (proper) claims Red Bull will ‘explode’ if Horner stays because the crew principal

It’s result in query marks over the way forward for Max Verstappen – who clinched victory in Bahrain

While Horner defiantly holds on to his £8million-a-year job, Max is Jos’s trump card on this high-stakes sport. No crew on the planet would wish to lose the companies of a driver who gilds even the nonpareil automobile crafted by the supreme designer in Formula One historical past, Adrian Newey.

Yes, maybe a number of drivers at present on the grid might win a world championship in it, however none might dominate as readily or emphatically because the Dutch magician. Who else might have received all however three races final season? Or put collectively an unprecedented 10 successive victories? Or sharpen his elbows to razors within the warmth of battle on such events as he must?

Arguably not even Lewis Hamilton, the seven-time world champion. For now, and the foreseeable future, Max is the perfect there’s.

So Jos, a former team-mate at Benetton of Michael Schumacher, with whom the Verstappens holidayed when Max was a child, has a potent bargaining software.

But, and right here is the fascinating conundrum, what if Jos shouldn’t be granted Horner’s head on a plate: would Max look elsewhere for upcoming employment? Conjecture has already linked him to Mercedes. Hamilton is leaving on the finish of the 12 months to hitch Ferrari for a final hurrah, opening up a seat there.

Grist is added to the hearsay mill by the truth that Jos dined with Mercedes crew principal Toto Wolff final week in Bahrain forward of the opening race. It would possibly simply have been a gathering of previous associates as Jos claims, although, it should be underlined, his relationship with Wolff soured in 2021, when Max was in hospital as Hamilton celebrated victory on the British Grand Prix after their coming collectively at Copse.

It deteriorated additional within the aftermath of the decider in Abu Dhabi, the place Verstappen pipped his bitter rival to the title on the ultimate lap after the maverick withdrawal of the protection automobile on an evening that may by no means be forgotten.

Mercedes’ Toto Wolff has stirred the pot for the reason that scandal broke and known as for transparency

Even although relations are a lot improved since two years in the past, it’s exhausting to completely dislocate a Jos-Toto dinner from the furore unfolding at Red Bull, even when the prospect of Max leaving his racing dwelling – hitherto a well-oiled instance of near-perfection – to take his probabilities at a Mercedes crew a good distance in need of its once-dominant peak are for now considerably distant. To underline the purpose, when Max received in Bahrain on Saturday, Mercedes’ George Russell was 47 seconds again and Hamilton 50 adrift.

For the second, decamping to the Silver Arrows would appear a idiot’s errand, and one that might solely be welcomed in anger. It is the nuclear possibility.

There can be Max’s Red Bull contract that runs till 2028, although it’s urged there are break clauses that may allow a transfer in 2026.

Verstappen Snr, who turns 52 at this time, won’t be in Jeddah this week, as a substitute returning to Belgium for a rally, his absence from the Formula One paddock little question a aid to him after the tension-stretching stint in Bahrain, when the Red Bull hospitality unit was a seething theatre of fake camaraderie. The warring factions appeared one another within the eye and smiled. That is likely to be as a result of in the event that they turned their backs they wouldn’t see the daggers coming.

The most extravagant demonstration of assist got here from Horner’s Spice Girl spouse Geri. She walked with him into the paddock. They held arms and kissed. The celeb couple are comforted by the assumption that until a brand new piece of proof, or a leaked e-mail revealing a brand new strand of criticism surfaces, Horner is comparatively protected.

Horner and his spouse Geri (left) placed on a public show of unity regardless of his texting scandal

Horner has refused to touch upon potential motives for these answerable for leaking texts

One hope for Jos as he wished Horner away was that the game’s homeowners, Liberty Media within the guise of Formula One Management (FOM), and the regulators, the FIA, would intervene and examine the claims themselves, or at the least ask to see the inner report performed by a KC on behalf of Red Bull Racing’s mother or father firm, Red Bull GmbH, that exonerated him final week. This appears unlikely to occur. The FIA, beneath president Mohammad Ben Sulayem, are quietly siding with Horner. FOM are silent bordering on publicly invisible.

Max’s views usually are not explicitly recognized. He is believed to be typically assist of his father’s stance. Tellingly, he refused on 4 events in press conferences over the previous weekend to supply Horner unconditional backing.

He merely defined that he thought that in efficiency phrases, his boss did an excellent job. There was the whiff of faint reward about his approval.

Red Bull issued a press release final evening in response to Jos’s feedback in Mail Sport, saying: ‘There are no issues here. The team are united and we are focused on racing.’

Which even by the requirements of current days takes some believing.