Red Bull team advisor Helmut Marko's message to demoted driver Liam Lawson is that his Formula One career is not over.

Lawson has been dropped by Red Bull just two races into the 2025 season, having crashed out of the opening race and qualified last for the second, in China last weekend.

The New Zealander was replaced by Yuki Tsunoda, who will be behind the wheel at next week's Japanese Grand Prix, while Lawson will return to sister team Racing Bulls.

But speaking on BBC Radio 5 Live Breakfast, Marko tried to apply some perspective to the situation and suggested that Red Bull had been too hasty in promoting Lawson.

"He's not kicked out of F1 and Racing Bulls will give him the chance to recover and his career will start again," Marko said.

"For the benefit of him, he goes back to Racing Bulls, which has a car capable of being top 10 in qualifying and the races.

"Just look in the past, it was [Pierre] Gasly. It happened the same, also to [Alex] Albon, and they recovered and they are now competitive F1 drivers.

"On top of it, the RB21 is a car which is not the fastest car but nevertheless very difficult to drive and Max [Verstappen] can handle it, but Liam, not at this stage."

Announcing that @yukitsunoda07 will partner Max from the #JapaneseGP pic.twitter.com/Pz05P7cFKF

— Oracle Red Bull Racing (@redbullracing) March 27, 2025

After crashing out in Australia and qualifying last for the Chinese Grand Prix, Lawson eventually placed 12th in the second race of the season, having had his finish boosted by disqualifications for both Ferrari drivers and Gasly.

Red Bull are third in the constructors' championship standings, behind McLaren and Mercedes, after the first two races.

Having lost the constructors' title to McLaren last season, Marko was clear that Lawson had not been up to the standard of a team aiming to reclaim the crown.

"His performance was unfortunately not good enough and that comes from self-confidence," said Marko.

"We have two drivers for the constructors' championship, we also need to support Max strategy-wise. 

"If you have two drivers in the top five or eight it is easier to give Max a strategy that favours the number one driver."