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F1: 5 strong candidates for Renault's vacancy in 2021

After losing Daniel Ricciardo to the 2021 F1 season, Renault admitted that the definition of the open position in the team will remain for the next few months. Despite having Fernando Alonso, Valtteri Bottas and Sebastian Vettel with uncertain futures, the French team does not intend to announce its new driver in the coming days, possibly due to the covid-19 crisis, which has been affecting the automaker as a whole.
In addition to having these experienced free drivers on the market, two of which are F1 champions (Vettel and Alonso), the French team still has the young revelations from its driver academy, the Renault Sport Academy. The Danish Christian Lundgaard and the Chinese Guanyu Zhou are the ones that most chase the wave, since both accelerate in Formula 2, the main category of access to F1.
Renault F1 team boss Cyril Abiteboul tried to minimize the uncertainty about the new driver, claiming that not even the 2020 season started on the tracks.

"Our position is more focused on using the time necessary to have all the information, to ensure that we are making the right decision, because probably the driver who signs with us for 2021 must also sign for 2022," Abiteboul told Motorsport.

Renault fights crisis
In parallel, Renault is also fighting bankruptcy. The French automaker is in serious risk of failure because of the covid-19 crisis. Bruno Le Maire, France's economy minister, declared to Europe 1 radio that Renault “could disappear”.
Behind the scenes of the crisis, Renault requested a loan of 5 billion euros (over 30 billion reais) to the French government, which owns approximately 15% of the carmaker's shares.

Rodrigo França and Luiz Felipe Chaguri-Brazil