“Alpine now looks forward to seeing the next stage in his F1 career alongside Esteban Ocon.”
However, the lack of a confirmation from Piastri only fuelled rumours that his manager Mark Webber had been negotiating with McLaren, which also wanted to hire the young Australian.
Szafnauer admitted in an interview with Autosport that after the shock Alonso announcement he attempted to contact Webber, and seemed to imply he had not had a response.
“This just happened on Monday,” he said when discussing recent moves in the driver market. “So it’s now Tuesday, his manager is in Australia, there’s a bit of a time difference.
“But I’ve been trying to get hold of Mark and wrote some text messages and some emails to him, as well. So give us a bit of time. Oscar is our number one preferred candidate. And that’s what we’re going to do.”
The Alpine boss stated that it had first call on Piastri, but the timing of the announcement – without the accompaniment of a quote or social media posts from Piastri – suggests the team did so to force the issue and lay claim to the Australian.
The situation appears to mirror that of McLaren’s attempted signing of Alex Palou in IndyCar, when his current team Ganassi announced a contract extension, which was then refuted by the driver, he drawing particular attention to a “fabricated” quote in the press release.
Ganassi has now sued Palou, with the Spaniard counter-suing for “defamation”.