Zak Brown blasts Australian fans amid row over team favouring Lando Norris

McLaren boss Zak Brown has sparked fresh controversy by attacking Australian critics who claim the team shows bias against Oscar Piastri in favour of Lando Norris.

McLaren boss Zak Brown has gone on the attack against Australians for questioning whether the British based team is favouring their English driver Lando Norris over Australia’s Oscar Piastri.

In an extraordinary rant on British television, Brown slammed Australian senator Matt Canavan for raising a question in parliament this week about whether there really was a British bias towards Norris.

“I saw what the senator said. Clearly, he’s very uninformed and uneducated about our sport,” Brown said.

Senator Matt Canavan wants to know if McLaren is biased against Oscar Piastri

“That’s the cool thing about sport. People get very supportive of their heroes of their countries, so I’m not surprised to see people waving the flag for their drivers.

“It’s most important to us that our team knows. And there are a lot of uneducated people out there and their views, and I’d spend all day trying to correct them, so it is what it is.“

Brown’s criticism of Canavan is unlikely to cool the debate that is raging in Australia right now McLaren’s treatment of Piastri. If anything, the outspoken American chief executive may have unwittingly poured more fuel on the fire.

There’s been rumours of disunity in the McLaren camp for months after Norris staged an incredible comeback to overtake Piastri for the championship lead.

With the title now on the line in Sunday’s season-ending Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, all that speculation has gone into overdrive and McLaren clearly aren’t happy about it.

The team did admit that it stuffed up badly at last weekend’s Qatar Grand Prix when Piastri was robbed of victory by a monumental strategic error from the McLaren pit wall, but insist it was an innocent mistake rather than some elaborate plan to benefit Norris.

Piastri’s army of Australian fans remain unconvinced despite Brown’s insistence they’ve all got it wrong.

“We have done the best we can. Oscar himself has talked about how fair and equitable (McLaren has been)” Brown told Sky Sports.

“We make mistakes but Oscar has been our number one spokesperson. He’s never said a single word that anything has ever not felt right.”

McLaren chief executive Zak Brown has denied rumours his team is favouring its English driver Lando Norris over Australia’s Oscar Piastri. Picture: AFP

While Piastri has expressed his frustration at some of the worst team decisions that have gone against him this season, he has never suggested his McLaren team were conspiring against them.

He is, however, well aware of the scepticism among Australians and was appreciative that his compatriots had his back.

“I did see it reach parliament. That’s quite impressive,” Piastri said.

“Obviously, I don’t see a huge amount of it. I’ve not been back to Australia since the Grand Prix but I think the fact that Formula 1 and regardless of why it was in parliament, the fact that my name is in parliament in Australia is pretty cool in some ways.

“I guess it signifies the magnitude of the support and the following that we’ve had back home. So that’s very, very cool to see, and I’ll try my best to bring it home for everyone.”

Originally published as Zak Brown blasts Australian fans amid row over team favouring Lando Norris