To know how divisive this Formula One season has been, how sporting rivalries have turned personal, you only had to experience the cheers that went up when Lewis Hamilton slid into the gravel in China yesterday. And that was just in the media centre.

Hamilton may be on a fast track to hero status in Great Britain, but there were plenty of people who could not hide a snigger as he ground to a halt just a few hundred yards from where the mechanics were ready with their tyres. There were more chuckles when he was forced to clamber on to the back of a yellow scooter for the short ride home.

The saviour of the sport? Bernie Ecclestone may believe so, but the rise of the rookie is not being sold as a feel-good story in every corner of the globe, and certainly not across swaths of southern Europe. There he is derided as a daddy’s boy who has received preferential treatment. A daddy’s boy with two protective fathers if you include Ron Dennis, the McLaren Mercedes team principal.

Now all those arguments are set for a dramatic resolution in Brazil in just less than a fortnight and, if Hamilton could find any good out of yesterday’s self-inflicted disaster, it is that holding his nerve at the Interlagos circuit in São Paulo will surely prove his worthiness as world champion. That, at least, is one way of looking at it, although nothing has been straightforward since he made his Formula One debut in March. He must have aged ten years in seven months.

We had come to watch his coronation yesterday only to see him depart from the complex before the race was finished and, while he remains in front and therefore in charge, nobody will be making bold predictions about what will happen at Interlagos. Who would bet against teammates Fernando Alonso and Hamilton taking each other out and Kimi Raikkonen dashing through to steal the World Championship for Ferrari? All we know is that the young man from Stevenage – and he did look young and a little vulnerable all of a sudden yesterday – has put himself under pressure that even veterans might struggle to withstand.

Were Hamilton to lose it from here, perhaps even his composure would slip, although who knows whether anyone would notice. Old television footage reveals that he had more poise as a 12-year-old than the majority of modern footballers have when they are 30 and he just about managed to maintain that calm front yesterday, even while he must have been in pieces inside. “I’m over it,” he said, and he almost looked as though he believed what he was saying. Alonso had taken a door off its hinges the previous day and perhaps Hamilton set about smashing something in private.

In public, we saw him make a point of going to the McLaren garage to shake hands with the mechanics and whatever was being said away from the cameras, he at least gave the impression that blame was being shared collectively between driver and team. “He came in to speak to everyone and, in the circumstances, that was very brave and showed his character,” Martin Whitmarsh, the McLaren chief operating officer, said. “He’s come through plenty already this season so I don’t doubt for a minute that he will bounce back.”

After that, Hamilton made a quick getaway. Retirement gave him the chance of an early flight home and, with little desire to cheer Alonso into second place, there was no point in waiting for the typhoon that arrived a few hours after the teams had packed up.

Hamilton did not depart without admitting his own culpability. Too fast into that innocuous pitlane corner given how his car was already sliding on its bald rear tyres, he had pushed harder than he needed to and seemingly harder than the team had instructed him to in the short duel with Raikkonen. Signs of impetuousness and inexperience, perhaps, but his team shared the blame. As Whitmarsh admitted, they had let him stay out at least one lap too long. It was a bad decision in any circumstances but it was a particularly foolish one here, given that Hamilton had the chance to secure the championship even with a third-place finish.

Hamilton still leads and had you told him back in March that he would be four points clear going into the final race, he would have been thrilled. He must now convince himself that victory will be even sweeter when he clinches it in Brazil, the home of his boyhood hero, Ayrton Senna. Having marvelled at his extraordinary self-certainty all season, his fans will expect him to demonstrate that his talent can withstand the final, ferocious buffeting.

It would be some triumph, although having talked over the weekend about the sniping that has been coming from his fellow drivers, Hamilton hardly needs telling that the alternative scenario will not lack popularity either.