Fernando Alonso has said that Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen would deserve to share this year's Formula 1 world championship and that the trophy should be split into two.

The 2021 season came to a controversial end on Sunday as Verstappen took the crown away from Hamilton on the final lap after a Safety Car period came to a contested end.

Indeed, it's a matter that is still being hotly debated days later but the feeling is over the season both drivers would have deserved the championship, despite how it was decided last weekend.

Certainly, that is the opinion of Fernando Alonso who has said that perhaps this year more than any other the trophy could have been split between the two and that they could have both been named champion:

“I think he’s a champion, it was a matter of time that he won the trophy,” Alonso said firstly of Verstappen.

“I think today he was lucky – without the safety car Lewis was world champion, and with the safety car Max is world champion. So it’s a pure luck thing what happened today.

“It’s going to be a big topic I guess, but if you take the 22 races, as I said on Thursday, any of the two could be world champion. I think more than any other year if you could split the trophy in two, this was the year to do it. Because both of them were outstanding.”

Of course, only one driver can be champion even in a year like 2021, and it was Max's day, in the end, on Sunday.