Mercedes 'take responsibility' for unusual Kimi Antonelli failure

Mercedes insists it must 'own a bit of responsibility' for a failure which hampered Kimi Antonelli's preparation for the Dutch GP. 

Early during FP1 on F1's return from the summer break, Antonelli beached the W16, losing the session on a scrappy weekend in which he picked up two penalties and also two penalty points after crashing into Charles Leclerc.

The Italian protege endured a tricky run of form throughout the European season, culminating in boss Toto Wolff declaring his performance at Monza was "underwhelming", although Antonelli bounced back with a strong fourth on both the grid and in the race in the Azerbaijan GP last time out. 

Analysing Antonelli's form, trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin has revealed how problems with the simulator hampered Antonelli's Zandvoort build-up. 

"With Zandvoort, he came in for a simulator session, and we had some issues," Shovlin told media, including RacingNews365. 

"That meant he wasn't able to prep there, and then he made a mistake in FP1, and I think we need to own a bit of that responsibility, as we couldn't do the normal prep. 

"He's shown enough in the early part of the season to confirm our expectations that he has the talent to be in F1 and be with Mercedes.

"But there is no doubt that after a string of poor performances and not scoring [points] at the rate George is, the pressure builds, and we've just got to help him manage that pressure.

"We've done a lot of development driving, and we've upped the amount of preparation which we are doing recently. 

"We're trying different things in terms of getting ready for race weekends going into these remaining races, and we'll just keep reviewing until we get it right. 

"He will develop with every race which he does, and often with young drivers, you'll see big steps going into their second year when they are going to tracks for the second time.

"Some of these tracks, he's either never driven them or he's driven them in an F2 or F4 car, and you're up against people with years and years of experience in F1, so it is always challenging for rookie drivers.

"But as I said, we will just keep reviewing our processes and modifying them, and we will get there."