McLaren boss doesn't want Liberty to bow to Mercedes and Ferrari

McLaren boss Zak Brown has insisted that the owners of Formula One, Liberty Media, should not bow to the demands of the sport's current two biggest teams, Ferrari and Mercedes, in the wake of their threats to leave the sport over proposed engine regulation changes.

Liberty are looking to implement engine changes ahead of the 2021 campaign which would see parts standardised among the teams, and Ferrari and Mercedes have took exception to the proposals as they think their status at the top would be under increased threat.

However, even with the demands of the Prancing Horse and the Silver Arrows for compromise, Brown has pleaded with Liberty not to back down in the talks.

“I think Liberty needs to focus on what is best for the sport and what is best for the fans,” said Brown.

“If that means a team or a manufacturer doesn’t support that, then they need to be prepared to recognise that they are not going to make everyone happy.

“Their centering needs to be on what is best for the sport. I would rather lose one [team], replace them and have 10 teams, than have one or two teams [only] in the championship.”

When asked by the media if he expects Ferrari and Mercedes to go through with their threat to leave, Brown said:

“I think that is highly unlikely, but I think anything is possible. Therefore we need to land on a set of rules that allow those that are looking at the sport to be able to come in.

“In the unexpected and hopefully highly unlikely situation that they [Mercedes and Ferrari] would leave, the sport needs to go on.

“I think Ferrari is a unique case because they are Ferrari, but we have lost BMW, we have lost Toyota, and we have lost Honda before. We’ve all seen manufacturers come and go in the sport and it has always survived.

“So we have got to write rules moving forward about what is best for the sport, not what is best for the manufacturers.”