Rosberg vindicated by stewards' decision on Bahrain GP incidents

Rosberg appeared to push both drivers off the track on separate occasions between Turns 3 and 4 as he defended hard, with Hamilton forced to overtake off circuit and Alonso forced to abandon his attempt.

The stewards of the meeting met with the drivers and their representatives following the grand prix to discuss the clashes, but it was decided Rosberg's moves were legitimate.

Rosberg said he agreed with the decision, saying: "Of course there were the two incidents with Lewis and Fernando, which were both definitely good racing.

"I even had to go to the stewards for that and thankfully they judged that it was tough but okay so I didn't get a penalty for that."

Rosberg said a superior strategy had helped salvage the damage of a disastrous opening lap, and insisted he was happy to have finished fifth as it was the best he and Mercedes could have hoped for.

"We saw some teams being able to handle [tyre management] better than others, and for me overall fifth place was an okay result," he added.

"The whole first lap didn't go well, I was in the wrong place at the wrong time and didn't get the best out of it, so I was back in ninth. From then on we had a great strategy so I came all the way back up to fifth, which even if we started at the front was probably the best we could have gotten today in terms of our speed.

"That's okay - 35 points now in one week is good and only 18 points off the championship lead, that's cool too."