26/03/2015
NEWS STORY
Sebastian Vettel has turned down Nico Rosberg's invite to the Mercedes garage claiming it is a publicity stunt.
Following Mercedes domination of the season opener, during one of their regular verbal spats during the post-race press conference, Vettel questioned Rosberg's wish for some increased competition from his team's rivals this year.
"Be honest. Do you really hope so? Seriously?" snapped Vettel. "You finished 30 seconds ahead of us and you hope it's going to be closer? So you hope you slow down? Is that what you're saying?"
"I hope that you can give us a challenge!" Rosberg hit back. "Because it's important for the sport and for the fans. And I do think about the show. Half of me - or a part of me - thinks about the show because I want to give people a great time at home watching on TV or at the track. If you do come a bit closer, that would be awesome for everybody."
"First suggestion," said Vettel, "if you don't mind, I think your garage becomes public for Malaysia and everyone can have a look. No? I'm joking."
"You can come if you want, we can invite you..." replied Rosberg, much to his teammate's surprise.
"OK, thank you for the invite, I'll come." laughed Vettel.
"Friday Malaysia, OK." confirmed Rosberg.
"Engineers' room? Debrief, I'll be there," smiled Vettel.
A couple of days later Rosberg took to Twitter to confirm that the 'invite' still stood. "I spoke to Toto and Paddy about an invitation for Sebastian and they are easy with it," he wrote. Dear Seb, this is the official invitation to join our debrief Friday 16.00 at Sepang. See you there, don't forget your notebook! :)"
However, as Fernando Alonso further muddied the waters in terms of his Barcelona crash, any hope of a little more controversy in the Sepang paddock was killed off when Vettel revealed he would not ne taking Rosberg up on his invitation.
"When I was joking with Nico in the press conference the deal was the invite was for all the paddock. Now it seems the invite has shrunk to just me," he told reporters. "Initially I think it was called off by Niki (Lauda) and Toto. Now they've told Rosberg yes, so I think they are using it as a bit more of a PR thing rather than a proper invite, so the answer is no I won't be going."
Asked whether his decision was down to him or his team, the German said: "It wasn't really discussed to be honest. Initially it was called off and then I think they tried to use it as ‘Oh yeah, we are so friendly and open to everyone'.
"Even if I went there, do you think they would really open up? That means I won't go, because even if I go it's all staged."
Did he really think it wasn't staged?
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