Sebastian Vettel gave a pretty subdued reaction to the incident with Max Verstappen which cost him a potential podium finish at the Chinese GP.The Ferrari driver, who had won the opening two races, led away again from pole position at the start of Sunday's race in Shanghai.After pulling out a three-second margin, he appeared to be controlling the pace in the opening third of the race but that all changed when Valtteri Bottas used the undercut by pitting earlier to move ahead after the one and only pit-stop.Unable to get back ahead of the Mercedes, the four-time champion's luck turned even worse as a Safety Car allowed both Red Bulls to change tyres again.Now on the defensive, he would be passed by eventual race winner Daniel Ricciardo but when Verstappen looked to squeeze by at Turn 14, the two would collide leading both to spin and dropping Vettel down to seventh.“I didn’t see him until very late so I left him a little bit of room,” the German explained afterwards.“To be honest I was expecting him to come earlier as I had no intention to resist as it was clear that he and Daniel were so much faster on the fresher tyres. I didn’t want to compromise my race to the guys behind."After Lewis Hamilton had heavily criticised the Dutchman following contact which had actually dropped the Red Bull driver out of the race in Bahrain, though he was much more disadvantaged, Vettel was much less critical of the young prodigy.“He made a mistake, he locked up, it happens," Vettel said. "We had a tailwind all race down the back straight. I guess he misjudged and it compromised both of our races.“Inside the car, you must not forget that the judgements are very difficult to make.“But you have to bear these things in mind and make sure you don’t crash. He could have easily taken his front wing off or had a puncture so in that case, we were both a bit lucky.”

The race only got worse for the championship leader with his worn tyres allowing Nico Hulkenberg to drive by into Turn 1 and then Fernando Alonso also caught and passed Vettel in the closing laps, demoting him to an eventual eighth-place finish.

Fans were quick to criticise Verstappen for what happened but he has since accepted the blame after also being given a 10-second time penalty by the stewards.