Jacques Villeneuve honest about Daniel Ricciardo feud after F1 favourite lost his seat

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Jacques Villeneuve, the 1997 F1 drivers’ champion, spoke to Mirror Sport about his public spat with Daniel Ricciardo this season and gave his reaction to the Aussie losing his seat on the grid

Jacques Villeneuve insists he takes no joy from Daniel Ricciardo losing his place on the Formula 1 grid.

That’s despite their very public feud earlier this season. It broke out at the Canadian Grand Prix when Villeneuve, working as a pundit for Sky Sports F1, was highly critical of the Australian and questioned: “Why is he still in F1?”

Ricciardo then qualified fifth in Montreal and snapped back at the 1997 champion by telling him to “eat s**t”. But that only prompted another barrage from Villeneuve who labelled the former Red Bull racer “unprofessional” and “childish”.

And then, speaking to Mirror Sport in July, Ricciardo expressed his disappointment that a former title-winning racer would be so publicly critical of another F1 star. But Villeneuve has no regrets at all.

The 53-year-old insists, though, that he never wanted things to become personal between himself and Ricciardo, who was axed from Red Bull’s sister team RB in September. “It never crossed my mind that I wanted to be proven right,” he told Mirror Sport , via SportsCasting.

“It got a lot of reaction, a lot of negative and some positive. It got a lot of people discussing the subject openly. It’s not a question of destroying someone, but you have to look at reality.

“I think people realised, ‘Okay, Jacques has a fair point, let’s discuss it in depth’, and that happened. That’s what I’m happy about. My feelings wouldn’t be any different if Daniel Ricciardo stayed at Red Bull. I’m not saying, ‘Oh, I’m happy now he’s left F1’. I’m just glad to have brought reality to the fore.”

“Daniel still has a great image and a great career, it hasn’t done him any damage. It was just a conversation about the racing industry which has got a bit side-tracked about what’s important. It was a case of saying what everybody was thinking. It’s not about me feeling vindicated about him being out of F1 or not.

“When you do punditry, you just try to talk about what is pertinent. It doesn’t mean you’re right and it’s hard to be neutral, no matter how hard you try. We all have feelings which come out. You want to make sure you give enough food for thought and enough food to make sure discussions happen. That’s what I’m glad about.”

Ricciardo has no place on the 2025 grid but, given his popularity among fans, particularly in the US, he has been heavily linked with the new Cadillac entry set to join the grid the following year. However, it is understood that the 34-year-old is not currently interested in driving for F1’s newest team.