Jacques Villeneuve thinks Oscar Piastri ‘hasn’t shown’ one thing that makes Lando Norris his 2025 F1 title favourite

Jacques Villeneuve picks Lando Norris as his favourite for the 2025 Formula 1 title as the McLaren driver holds a key advantage over his teammate and rival, Oscar Piastri.

It is widely expected that McLaren face an internal war for the championship this term after starting the 2025 Formula 1 season as the clear team to beat. Norris and Piastri have led the way in Australia, China but not Japan as they try to establish their supremacy in their garage.

Norris won the Australian Grand Prix from pole position to even take the lead of the drivers’ standings for the first time in the Briton’s career. Round two also saw Piastri convert his first F1 pole position to win in China and bounce back from spinning while second in Melbourne.

But McLaren’s qualifying stranglehold came to an end at the Japanese Grand Prix after Max Verstappen handed Red Bull their first pole position of the season. The four-time defending champion stunned Norris and Piastri to deny the McLarens P1 by 0.012 and 0.044 seconds.

Jacques Villeneuve backs Lando Norris for the 2025 F1 title as Oscar Piastri lacks consistency

Piastri will likely need to win the Japanese GP and hope Norris finishes no higher than third place on Sunday for the Australian to draw level atop the F1 drivers’ championship. His spin in Melbourne’s mixed conditions cost the hometown hero dearly as he recovered to just P9.

Despite Norris’ tyre graining problems in the Shanghai Sprint allowing Piastri to regain some points on his teammate, the Briton has a 10-point lead in which Max Verstappen and George Russell split the McLarens. And 1997 champion Villeneuve backs Norris to maintain his lead.

READ MORE: Every error that cost Lando Norris points in his failed 2024 F1 title challenge

While Norris has proven to Villeneuve that the Bristol-born racer can yield consistent results even on a bad day, the Canadian has not yet seen Piastri do so. The Melbourne native set an average finishing position of P4.92 in the 2024 season compared to Norris’ P4.29 average.

Villeneuve noted on Sky Sports F1 (05/04, 06:05): “I would still go with Norris because he’s shown last year that he can keep his level race after race. Even when it was a bad weekend or there was a crash, he was still back up there.

“There was only Max up there who did that – not Piastri, he hasn’t shown it yet. He has the speed but, now, he has to show that he can keep it up weekend after weekend.”

Oscar Piastri will feel he can prove Jacques Villeneuve wrong and 2024 proves it

Norris enjoyed a great stretch between the fifth and 20th rounds of the 2024 season to see the McLaren driver emerge as a potential title contender for the first time in his career. The Briton only failed to finish on the podium five times over a period which returned three wins.

He further finished second in five Grands Prix, and would likely have also won in Spielberg if not for Verstappen hitting Norris in the 2024 Australian Grand Prix and causing the McLaren man to retire. Piastri had his best stint from rounds seven to 18 with two wins and four P2s.

F1’s stint from the 2024 Austrian GP to the Singapore Grand Prix will particularly encourage Piastri that he can prove Villeneuve’s concerns wrong and fight Norris for the 2025 title. He was the in-form driver over that period with 150 points to Norris’ 129 and Verstappen’s 112.