Shock Daniel Ricciardo return sparks ‘silly season’ rumours involving three other drivers

Jamie Woodhouse 12 Jul 2023 4:30 PM

Daniel Ricciardo wearing sunglasses in the Melbourne paddock. Australia March 2023

With Nyck de Vries out and Daniel Ricciardo in at AlphaTauri, F1 presenter Will Buxton has detailed how the cards may now fall for that duo and two other racers in the F1 driver market.

Only 10 grands prix into his AlphaTauri career, Red Bull have already decided that enough was enough for De Vries, Red Bull and AlphaTauri advisor Helmut Marko claiming that there had been no sign of improvement from the Dutchman and so they “had to do something”.

And Daniel Ricciardo’s impressive showing in his Silverstone Pirelli tyre test that day, where he reportedly set a fastest time which would have merited a front-row grid slot for the 2023 British GP, convinced Red Bull that he was up to the task of heading to AlphaTauri on loan for the remainder of the F1 2023 campaign.

Nyck de Vries and Daniel Ricciardo F1 ‘silly season’ triggers?

公式1主持人将巴克斯顿认为这可能be the case, and on top of plotting out what may happen next for Ricciardo and De Vries, he theorised how this situation could also lead to ramifications for Red Bull’s Sergio Perez and Red Bull junior Liam Lawson, who is currently competing in Japan’s Super Formula.

“Happy for Daniel but exceptionally harsh on Nyck,” Buxton wrote on social media. “As I’ve said, think this has more to do with applying pressure to PER [Perez] while assessing potential RIC [Ricciardo] return to [Red Bull Racing], or how TSU [Yuki Tsunoda] fares against a known quantity, than Nyck himself.

“It shouldn’t be a surprise if Ricciardo ends up back at RBR. No line-up since his departure has been as strong as him and Max [Verstappen].

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“How the rest of the field could shake up makes for an intriguing bit of mental gymnastics.

“Lawson to AT [AlphaTauri] makes complete sense as a strong option for ’24.

“As for Checo [Perez], how about a dream return to team Silverstone alongside [Fernando] Alonso at Aston [Martin]?

“And De Vries gets on the phone to former Merc colleague James Vowles and returns to Williams alongside [Alex] Albon.”

Before any of these extra puzzle pieces potentially fall into place, first all eyes will be on Ricciardo as he returns to the cockpit at the Hungarian Grand Prix.

Having driven the dominant force of F1 2023, the Red Bull RB19, at Silverstone, Ricciardo now moves into arguably the slowest challenger on the grid in the AlphaTauri AT04.