Vettel: Hamilton left me no choice

Sebastian Vettel has been reflecting on the crash with Lewis Hamilton on the first lap of a pulsating Italian Grand Prix, and believes that the Brit left him no room to move and that he had no other choice but to make conact with the Mercedes.

Vettel came off worse in the incident, spinning 180 degrees and ending up at the back of the field, as Hamilton went on to challenge Kimi Raikkonen and ultimately overtake him for a valuable fifth Monza victory.

The German was able to fight through the pack to claim fourth, but the 30-point gap to Hamilton could mean the incident created a damaging afternoon for Ferrari.

Vettel's attitude was mixed afterwards, telling Sky Sports: "You have more angles than I have, I tried to pass Kimi but I didn’t really have a gap and I didn’t want to try something silly.

"So I got out of it, Lewis saw a little bit around the outside but then I think he didn’t leave me any space and I had no other choice but to run into him and make contact.I tried to obviously get out from there but I couldn’t, unfortunately I was the one that spun around which is ironic, but was that way, but then you are looking the wrong way and things don’t look too peachy.

"From there I think we drove well, we still got a lot of points so it could have been a lot worse today."

Vettel was also upbeat about the rest of the season, feeling that the race for the world championship is far from over.

He added: "It doesn’t help when you lose points but it’s not the end of the world. We are down at the moment, mostly for the people, their support has been incredible, unfortunately we didn’t deliver but what can you do.

"I’m not too worried, I think if we have the pace then it doesn’t take a long time to get there."