Formula 1 was rocked by bombshell reports on Thursday morning that seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton is on the verge of a sensational switch to Ferrari.
Hamilton has been with Mercedes since 2013, winning six world championships with the team during the most successful driver-team partnership in F1 history.
Things have not been as rosy since Hamilton's iconic 2021 title battle with Max Verstappen. The Brit has gone two full seasons without winning a race as Mercedes drift further and further away from the now-dominant Verstappen and Red Bull.
Despite Mercedes' struggles, Hamilton had last year agreed a contract extension with the team through to the end of the 2025 season. It now seems as though he will cut that deal short a year early to join Ferrari, in a move which Irishman Eddie Jordan called almost a year ago.
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Eddie Jordan called for Lewis Hamilton to make Ferrari switch
Speaking to talkSPORT in April 2023, former F1 team boss Jordan said that he felt that "every great champion" should enjoy a spell with F1's most iconic team, and called on Hamilton to make the switch to avoid his career going "stale."
I think he would like to win his eighth title but I have a passion in that I think he should go to Ferrari...but that’s just me talking nonsense.
The reason why is I don’t want him to become stale, and I think when he was at McLaren he did well but he moved quickly to Mercedes.
I was one of the people with Niki Lauda who helped that happen, and then there was a refreshed, rejuvenated Lewis Hamilton. We know what he’s done since then, however, I think it’s time he moved on.
I think if there’s an opportunity to go somewhere he should go to Ferrari because every great champion should at least have a spell at Ferrari. It just oozes with style and grandeur.
Lewis Hamilton of Mercedes racing against Charles Leclerc of Ferrari in the 2023 Australian GP (Photo: Shutterstock)
In a separate interview a month prior, Jordan had made a similar point, saying that the move would be in the interests of both parties.
Formula 1 needs Lewis Hamilton in a Ferrari and Ferrari needs Lewis Hamilton.
Famously, Eddie Jordan was the first F1 pundit to report that Hamilton would make a similar bombshell switch from McLaren to Mercedes for the 2013 season. With the McLaren arguably the quickest car on the grid in 2012 and Mercedes struggling, it seemed a daft move at the time - but Hamilton and Mercedes would go on to forge an iconic partnership.
A move to Ferrari at this stage of his career would be a similarly bold and risky move for the Brit.
The BBC report that Mercedes could inform team staff of Hamilton's imminent departure as early as 2pm on Thursday, making it seem a real possibility we will shortly get confirmation that he will be driving a red car in 2025.
By the time he does join the Scuderia, Hamilton will be 40. Ferrari have built undeniably quick cars the past two years, but their strategical failures and ineptitude with race management would leave question marks as to whether they are the team to propel Hamilton to a record-breaking eighth world title.
There is also the matter of Ferrari's long-standing commitment to Charles Leclerc to consider. The Monégasque driver recently signed a contract extension with the team, who have seemingly built their operation around him in an attempt to deliver his maiden world title. The arrival of Hamilton could lead to tensions.
But the romance of this move cannot be denied. Virtually all of F1's greats - bar Hamilton's hero Ayrton Senna - have driven for Ferrari in the past, the lure of the iconic team simply too great to resist.
Schumacher. Lauda. Fangio. Ascari. Surtees. Hawthorn. Hill. Scheckter. Raikkonen. If Lewis Hamilton could add his name to the list of Ferrari world champions, it could well cement his legacy as the greatest.
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