International media saw 'a sense of desperation' in Verstappen during his incident with Russell

After Kimi Antonelli's car failure brought out the safety car, Verstappen was put onto the hard tyres, with the rest of his rivals around him on the faster soft tyres.

On the restart, he almost slid into the wall, allowing Charles Leclerc to get by him even before they made it to turn 1, before George Russell dived down the inside, pushing Verstappen off the track and meaning he had to go off on the escape road to stay ahead of Russell.

The Dutchman was then told to let the Brit through, but while doing that, Verstappen swerved into Russell and collided with him, giving him a ten-second time penalty, dropping him to P10. Afterwards, the Red Bull driver said he would "bring tissues next time" after Russell had his say on the incident.

As was the case after the race, The Daily Mail could only talk about that incident between Verstappen and Russell.

The British newspaper saw the two sides to the Dutchman: "[Verstappen] blew his top and lost his composure. A few minutes later, he was gracious as he spoke about his deed of moments earlier, if unrepentant. Introspection is not his style. Action is. It is part of the DNA that makes him by a wider margin superior to the next best of his contemporaries than anyone in history."

However, the medium had some strong words on the collision that now puts the 27-year-old one penalty point away from a race ban: "There was a sense of desperation, of not being in charge of all he surveyed, that, surely, impelled him to drive deliberately into George Russell."

"Verstappen, on hard tyres, was outdone at the restart, unlike his rivals on soft tyres. Chaos ensued when the Dutchman clashed with Charles Leclerc and George Russell," was how German medium Auto Motor und Sport started with their description of the incident.

"[Verstappen] was supposed to let the Mercedes driver pass later because he had taken a shortcut. But Verstappen crashed into his car instead," they continued.

Spanish paper Marca were also only talking about that incident between the two drivers: "Verstappen was penalised for touching Russell and ended up plummeting down the standings to tenth, with the final ten seconds added to his time."

The medium then continued by saying that after just nine races, that incident may have cost the Red Bull Racing driver his championship chances: "Being as stubborn as he was with the Englishman, whom he's been chasing since last year, could cost him his fifth consecutive world championship. He's 49 points behind Piastri, and that's already too much."

French medium L'Equipe also saw something very rare that occurred while unpacking the whole incident: "This Sunday, two laps from the finish, Max Verstappen lost control. Of his Red Bull, which rarely happens to him, but also of his nerves, which he's more accustomed to."

"After his team radioed him to offer his fourth place to George Russell, whom he had resisted three laps earlier by taking a runoff outside the first corner, Verstappen initially reacted with anger in his voice, feeling he was in the right," concluded the French paper.