Starting an impressive third on the grid, Sutil was back cooling his heels soon after, while his teammate Vitantonio Liuzzi at least had the consolation of finishing 12th after starting from the back of the grid.

Sutil started third at the Interlagos before Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen overtook him, brushing the wheels of the Force India car.

Trying to overtake Sutil, Trulli came in contact with him and both were in a tangled mass soon, leading to a war of words between the drivers.

"Trulli was there on the outside trying to go round. It was a really stupid maneouvre as there was no space and I couldn't see him at all," an enraged Sutil later said.

"At that point it wasn't worth it and it ended my race far too early on as I went over into the gravel. Jarno was furious and said it was my mistake but I just told him what had happened to me. But it's over and now he's just got to deal with it," added the German.

Force India chairman Vijay Mallya did not hide his disappointment at missing a golden opportunity to score points, if not a podium finish, on a track that suited the car.

"For sure we had expected much more from this race," Mallya said.

"Adrian did an amazing job in qualifying and we were confident we could have picked up another few points, but unfortunately he was just a victim of the accident. He deserved much more," he added.

"Tonio's race was always going to be tough after yesterday's crash but he picked up another race finish - again by tailing home a Ferrari," he said.

Liuzzi said it was a glitch-strewn race for him but he was happy at least to have brought the car home.

"It was a long race, starting from last on the grid after the gearbox change yesterday. We made a change to the soft tyres in the safety car period, using them for just one lap to get them out of the way as we felt we couldn't do longer stints with them," he said.

"We struggled a lot with oversteer on the second stint. Then at the end I had a brake problem, which compromised the race but at least we finished this difficult Grand Prix, which was important," said the Italian.

Source: PTI