Alfa Romeo took months to announce which driver will sit alongside Valtteri Bottas next season. This month the team presented Guanyu Zhou as a reinforcement. As Alfa Romeo is getting a lot of criticism for this choice, Oscar Piastri is stepping in for Zhou.
Both drivers will compete for the world title in Formula 2 this year. Piastri is still on top of the championship standings, so he seems to have the most rights to a place in Formula 1. Nevertheless, Alfa Romeo decided to make a different choice and put Zhou forward.
Piastri emphasizes qualities of Zhou
According to several media outlets, Zhou mainly brings a lot of money, but Piastri believes that the Chinese has great qualities as well. "Of course, there has been quite a bit of negativity passed around on social media and the like, but I think it was mostly quite unfair. Of course, we know he brings financial support. But he's not doing a bad job after all," he told Motorsport.com.
"He is second in the championship, has the same number of wins as me. He was leading the first part of the year in the championship. He's not like he hasn't performed anything. It's definitely going to be tough for him against Valtteri. He has a very strong teammate in Valtteri. But I'm curious to see how he does, I'm confident."