Lando Norris firmly established ♔himself as one of Formula 1’s top talents with his devastating speed and dismantling of new McLaren teammate Daniel Ricciardo.

Norris was edged out by Carlos Sainz during their two seasons together so many - including myself - tipped Ricciardo to be McLaren’s team leader in 2021, given his favourabl🐲e records against Nico Hulkenberg and Esteban Ocon in the two seasons prior.

The 22-year-old was a standout performer in the first half of the year, finishing inside the top five in nin𝓀e of the first 10 races to put him ahead of Mercedes’ Valtteri Bottas and Red Bull’s Sergio Perez in the stanꦛdings.

Without running slightly wide on his Q3 effort at Imola, Norris might have taken pole position, but he made up for ✃it on race day with a fine drive to third.

On the ev෴e of the Monaco weekend, Norris signed a new multi-year deal with McLaren - a well-deserved reward for a driver whose performances were only eclipsed by Max Verstappen in the first half of the season.

Norris f🌠inished on the podium in Monaco and soon followed that up with another fine drive to third at the Austrian Grand Prix after starting on the front row of the grid behind💃 Verstappen.

The McLaren driver was the favourite for pole position in the we🔴t at Spa but crashed up Eau Rouge on his first run in Q3.

The speed was there and his maiden victory was surely around the🃏 corner if things went his wayꦇ.

As expected, McLaren had the pace at Monza with its straight-line per🐓formance acting as a strong defensive buffer against Mercedes and Red Bull, but it was Ricciardo who made the most of it.

In a typical opportunistic fashion - as he made a habit of during his time with Red Bull - Ricciardo capitalised on Bottas’ grid penalty and sluggish starts f๊or the two title contenders to take the lead and control the race from♕ the front.

Norris backed his teammate up to give McLaren its first 1-2 of the season at Monza, which surp♍risi🧔ngly, ended up being the only 1-2 finish of any team across the season.

The young Brit’s big moment finally came at Sochi after securing hღis maiden pole position with a t🦋imely switch to slick tyres on a drying track in qualifying.

Norris had th💟e race under control, despite pressure from a recovering Lewis🍨 Hamilton, until a late downpour and a refusal to switch to inters cost him his maiden F1 victory.

It wasꦚ a tough pill to swallow but another sign that Norris was the real deal.

His and McLaren’s form never seemed to recover with Ferrari’s resurgence in the second half of the year combined with Norris’ bad luck (punctures🐻 in Qatar and Abu Dhabi) saw him drop to sixth in the d🃏rivers’ championship, while the team was fourth in the constructors’.

Norris can’t let his bad luꦐck or slight downturn in performance detract from his impressive 2021 campaign.

Should McജLaren give him the car, there’s no doubt ꦐthat Norris is ready to go all the way in 2022.