Alpine hits out at Oscar Piastri (again)

As is well known, Alpine will not have talent Oscar Piastri at its disposal next season and that does not sit well with the French team. Also in Monza, the Australian was criticised by Alpine, this time by CEO Laurent Rossi.

Before Fernando Alonso decided to swap Alpine for Aston Martin, Alpine had planned to loan reserve driver Piastri to Williams for two years. After this period Piastri would get a chance at Alpine. But Piastri opted for a contract with McLaren, an agreement that was declared legally valid last week. Rossi now admits that there was no valid contract with Piastri, but at the same time criticises his attitude.

Rossi says in The Race it very disappointing how Piastri has dealt with Alpine, citing how loyal the French have been and how much has been invested in the youngster. Rossi realises that contractual mistakes were made. "We never thought – it was a bit of oversight for sure – we never thought we had to worry about us," he says.

According to Rossi, Piastri did not want to gain experience elsewhere and then join Alpine. Rossi would consider this a normal trajectory, referring to how Max Verstappen and Carlos Sainz, for example, ended up in a top team. "He himself acknowledges that he didn’t want the seat at Williams, that’s as simple as that. First and foremost, we disagree with this attitude because this is not what you do, it’s not good form. But good form doesn’t seem to be prevalent.”