Mercedes’ strategy at Suzuka came under scrutiny but they have been reminded that they must fa🌠ce even biggꦯer problems.

Mercedes’ decision to equip Lewis Hamilton and George Russell with hard🀅 tyres at the restart after a red flag at the F1 Japanese Grand Prix failed to yield resulಞts.

H🃏amilton finished ninth, Russell seventh, behind a Red Bu༒ll 1-2 and both Ferraris among others.

Red Bu𝓀ll and Ferrari 💙opted for a different strategy to Mercedes.

Hamilton questioned the strategy via 🍌team radio during the race before later insisting his team couldn’t have done anything differently.

But Maꦆrk Webber has reminded them that tyre strategy is the least of😼 their concerns.

🅺“They rolled the dice,” Webber s𝐆aid to Channel 4 after the Japanese Grand Prix.

“They restarted on the hards. They we𒊎re looking at making a one-stop work𒅌.

“Failed. Too optimistic.

“Then, track position. They ha𝓰d ༒to come back through.

“Then both of them put the mediums on, at the end. So they convert💦ed to a [two🦋-stop] there.

“They tried, and they went all-in with both cars too, off th🍷e line ꧅with that hard tyre.

“They haven’t got the speed at the moment. They just haven’t go🤡t the speed.

“You can do whatever strategy you want. But if you ♔haven’t got a quick car? Good luck.”

The W15 gave Hamilton a rare good feeling at the start of t꧙he weekend in Japan yet Mercedes are still no closer to significantly challenging the Red Bulls.

Hamilton insisted he wouldn’t have fought gained anything with an alternate tyre strate𒆙gy.

“Nothing, I don’t think,” he said. “I don’t know what꧅ the different strategy would have been.

“Whether it was the mediums to start with? But we still had two terrible hard tyres to run through. It was a real c꧒hallenge.”

Red Bull’s C📖hristian Horner insisted that tyre strategy꧃ was not crucial in Japan.

“I don’t think there was much in it,” he said.

“The track was warmer🅷 today, that brought the cars into a different operating window.

“The circuit just gets faste🌠r and faster throughout the race.”