Italian Grand Prix: Force India tell Sergio Perez, Esteban Ocon to race 'responsibly' on weekend

Monza: Force India told their duelling drivers Sergio Perez and Esteban Ocon on Friday that they can race “responsibly” in this weekend’s Italian Grand Prix.

The spectre of team orders was in the air in the warring Force India garage after the duo’s rivalry resulted in a series of clashes and crashes.

But after Perez and Ocon held clear the air talks on Thursday their team have decided to let them race freely in Monza.

Deputy team chief Bob Fernley told reporters that days of discussions had ensured that Mexican Perez and French rookie Ocon understood the expectations and had accepted them.

“From a team point of view, we’ve got to make sure fourth place (in the constructors’ championship) is secured,” he said.

“It’s very important for the team and, from their point of view, they need to make sure they keep their reputations intact because there’s a future for them beyond Force India — for both of them.”

Both men have been linked with other teams and it was expected that their rivalry — culminating in two collisions at last Sunday’s Belgian race — would have to be muted by the introduction of team orders.

But Fernley said Force India wished to allow them to race, but in a more respectful and less reckless fashion.

“We don’t want to prevent that (racing),” he said. “There are a number of situations in a race that you can’t control - the start, for instance.

“How do you control the start when there are cars going in all directions? So, the answer is we want to encourage them to race, but we want them to do it responsibly.”

He added: “You’ve got to accept that we’ve got two great and very talented drivers and both of them are obviously very focused and very determined…

“That’s exactly what we want and we don’t want, in any way, to dilute that. The chats that we’ve had haven’t worked. They’ve obviously had to be a little bit stronger.”

“They’re intelligent guys, and they’ve sorted it out amongst themselves, and realised it’s not going to help their careers.

“They know themselves, they’ve gone through the footage, they’ve sat down and looked at it with the team. They realise that there was an error of judgement on both their parts on a couple of occasions, and they’ll grow up and deal with it.”

Fernley denied that the drivers had been threatened with sanctions, such as a race ban.

“The first thing is that whatever we do from a team order point of view is obviously an internal matter, and wouldn’t be shared.

“We’ll deal with what we need to deal with as and when, but I don’t think there will need to be anything as Draconian as that.

“All of the top teams have the same problem at some point, all get resolved, and all move on. It’s part of the growing process.”