Sergio Perez may never have been hired by Red Bull if Alex Albon hadn't had his confidence "hurt massively" by collisions with Lewis Hamilton.
Albon spent 18 months racing for Red Bull. He had been called up from the Toro Rosso sister team mid-way through the 2019 season, swapping places with Pierre Gasly who was drowning under the pressure.
The British-Thai racer got much more time to impress compared to his French counterpart. But he too struggled to make much of an impression as team-mate to Max Verstappen.
It might have all gone differently, though, had it not been for Hamilton. The Mercedes driver span Albon when he was in podium contention on two separate occasions.
The first incident occurred at Interlagos in 2019, when Albon was on for his first ever F1 podium. But on the penultimate lap he was span around by the Mercedes, after which Hamilton admitted he was wholly to blame.
And, at the season-opening Austrian Grand Prix the following year, the pair clashed again which sent Albon into the gravel. He went on to secure two podiums later in 2020, but it was not enough for him to keep his seat.
Helmut Marko, a long-serving adviser to Red Bull, feels Albon might have kept his seat had it not been for the lasting effects of those incidents. "The decision was between Albon and Perez. I have to say Alex was really unlucky," he told the Inside Line podcast.
"In Brazil, he was fighting for second position when Hamilton turned him around. The next [incident] was more severe in Austria when Alex was fighting for the race. That hurt his confidence massively. We needed someone we knew could fight for the championship, we needed to solve a crisis."
Perez has won five races since joining Red Bull and recorded 15 more podiums. Still, though, there remain doubts over his future with the team in the midst of his collapsing title bid against Verstappen who has been in a class of his own so far this year.
Some have suggested reserve driver Daniel Ricciardo might be called up if Red Bull decided to make a change. While Marko admits the team will be putting the Australian through his paces at an upcoming test, he insists the team will honour Perez's current contract.
He said: "First of all, Checo is still second in the championship, so the first goal is to defend his position and I'm sure if he focuses on just achieving that he will be a good driver for Red Bull Racing.
"With Ricciardo, he will have a test in Silverstone and from there we see where he's standing but [there are no immediate plans]. We have a contract with Checo which goes till the end of '24 and, of course, we have to think what will happen after that but if Ricciardo recovers.
"If it is the old Ricciardo which we knew he was a very competitive driver. I don't exactly know what happened at Renault and McLaren especially, why he lost the edge, but we have to evaluate it."
