Nico Rosberg brutally demands Max Verstappen DQ for George Russell clash

Nico Rosberg believes Max Verstappen should have been issued a black flag for his “horrible” driving against George Russell during the final laps of the Spanish Grand Prix.

Verstappen was instructed by Red Bull to hand back the position to Mercedes rival Russell as the Barcelona Formula 1 race neared its conclusion.

The message was in response to Verstappen running wide at Turn 1 and gaining an advantage while defending fourth place from Russell at a late safety car restart on lap 61 of 66.

Verstappen was initially fuming at the request from Red Bull but did slow down heading into Turn 5 in order to let Russell through. However, just when Russell was completing the move around the outside of the left-hander, the Dutchman appeared to speed up again, leading to contact between the pair.

The four-time world champion eventually gave way to Russell at Turn 11, but the stewards held him responsible for the previous clash and handed him a 10-second time penalty, dropping from fifth to 10th in the final classification.

Nico Rosberg judges Max Verstappen v George Russell incident

However, 2016 F1 champion Rosberg feels the sanction was too lenient, stating Verstsappen’s actions were too dangerous and warranted a bigger penalty.

"Wow, that’s bad, bad, bad," he said on Sky's F1 broadcast. "That is seriously bad. He just rams him, full on. 

"You need to black flag that, there is no other way. Max was in the right - at first. The team went against Max and caused him to boil over."

Verstappen struggled on hard tyres at the safety car restart with six laps to go and lost the final podium spot to Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc on the start/finish straight, with Russell also emerging into the picture heading into Turn 1.

While the two initially appeared to be neck-and-neck, Verstappen ran wide around the apex as they made contact and had to take the escape road.

He rejoined the track ahead of the three-time grand prix winner, setting off a chain of events that led to the controversial Turn 5 incident later in the race.

In this case, Rosberg believes Russell was to blame for the incident, as he believes the Briton wasn’t fully in control of the car.

“I can tell you how it is. It was Georges’s fault,” Rosberg said. “He went in too hot. He oversteered out. He tapped into Max, who of course has to use the escape road.

“Then Max could have stayed in front because that was not the way to do a pass. Because George overcooked it in.

“The team messed up saying that George passed. That really annoyed Max because he knows that George rammed him off the track. 

“In Max’s eyes he was 100 percent in the right so why are you telling me to do this? ‘That guy just rammed me off, watch this, I will show you what he did!’ He slowed down then rammed into [Russell]. 

“Which is even worse. If you slow down to ram into another driver, that’s pretty bad.”

Rosberg stood by his initial comments when he reflected afterwards.

"The first one was George’s fault because he only complied with two out of three things that you need to comply with when you overtake," he said.

"So Max could have stayed in front and didn't have to give up the place.

"Red Bull told him to give up the place and that caused his blood to boil more.

"Then it looked like a very intentional retaliation. Wait for the opponent, ram him, like you felt the other guy rammed you.

"That is something extremely unacceptable. The rules are black flag."