Sebastian Vettel says he ღ;“couldn’t avoid” crashing into the back of Alpine's Esteb🧔an Ocon in the season-opening Formula 1 Bahrain Grand Prix.

While running well outside of the top ten, Vettel drove into the bജack o💫f Ocon on the run down to Turn 1.

The German was handed a 10-second time penalty and two penalty points on hꦺis superlicence for the incident.

The four-time world champion complained Ocon had moved under brakin👍g, although the stewards’ verdict disagreed with this view.

The stewards’ verdict read: "The Stewards reviewed multiple angles of video evidence and telemetry and determined that Car 5 was wholly to blame for the contact 🅰at Turn 1."

Reflecti🌳ng on the incident with Ocon, Vettel felt he had nowhere to go.

“I was sure he was leaving me space on the left but then he crossed back and as ꧒soon as I was behind him I locked up and couldn’t avoid hitting him,” Vettel said.

Vettel’s debut for Aston Martin has been nothing short of a nightmare after he picked⛦ up a five-place grid penalty before the race for failing to slow down for yellow flags in qualifying.

In a bid to turn his weekend around, Aston💛 Marti🐼n put the German on a one-stop strategy, but he never looked like he was going to break into the points-paying positions in Bahrain.

"It's been a tricky race, we tried the one stop, we had to try sometꦯhing different," Vettel added.

"Initially it looked like it wasn't that bad but first stint but toward🃏s the end I was struggling quite a bit with tyres so 🎐I don't think we could have realistically scored points."

Aston Martin teammate Lance Stroll finished tenౠth, scoring one point.