Andrea Stella insists that Oscar Piastri remains free to fight his teammate, Lando Norris for the title.

Disastrous back-to-back weekends have left McLaren on the cusp of losing a title that was theirs for the taking, the only factor being which of its two drivers would come out on top.

Now, heading into the season finale, Max Verstappen is just 12 points behind Norris, however the Woking team refuses to rule out its Australian driver and insists that he is free to battle his teammate for the crown.

"When it comes to the fact that we have two drivers in the quest for the World Championship, our philosophy and our approach will not change," he told reporters in the aftermath of Sunday's strategic own goal. "We will leave both Oscar and Lando the possibility to compete and pursue their aspiration.

"Oscar, from a points point of view, is definitely in condition to win the title," he continued, though the Australian is 16 points adrift of his teammate. "We have seen before in the history of Formula One that when you have this kind of situation, sometimes it's the third one that actually wins.

"We have seen it, I think, in 2007, in 2010, and Oscar is fast," he added, though 2007, when Kimi Raikkonen grabbed the crown from under the noses of McLaren drivers Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso, is probably not an example the Italian wants to remember, though he was with the Maranello outfit at the time, indeed he was performance engineer to the championship-winning Finn.

"I think he deserves to be able to just realise his performance," said Stella. "We will let the drivers be in condition to race each other. What's important for us is that we are in condition to beat Verstappen with one of our two drivers."

However, the Italian admits that the team will discuss various scenarios to prevent Verstappen claiming the title, including one McLaren driver aiding the other.

"Whatever call we make in terms of using the collaboration of our drivers, we will have to follow some of our fundamental principles, which are foundational to our approach," said Stella. "We want to be fair to our drivers, we want to race with integrity, and we want to race in a way that doesn't surprise our drivers.

"So between now and Abu Dhabi, there will be a further conversation with Lando and Oscar," he added. "We will confirm our racing approach, but certainly what I can say is that if any of the drivers is in a condition to pursue the quest to win the title, then we will respect this.

"There will be no call which excludes the other driver when the other driver is in a condition to win. So we will see what scenarios will unfold, but definitely what I can say is that there will be conversations and there will be a way of going racing which is united between the team and the drivers like we have always done."

Nonetheless, doubts remain over just how fair McLaren is being, with some still convinced that Sunday's decision not to pit under the Safety Car was because the move would have aided Piastri while compromising his teammate.