Ferrari brush off driver ‘headache’: ‘Rather have two good ones than **** ones!’

Ferrari team principal Fred Vasseur is far from concerned about the prospect of not having a clear ‘number one’ driver at the team.

With Carlos Sainz proving to be more than a match for Charles Leclerc throughout the season so far, taking victory in Singapore last time out and leading against his team-mate in the Drivers’ standings, the consensus of Sainz going to Ferrari to act as second fiddle to Leclerc has been eroded.

Ferrari have always maintained their drivers have been able to battle each other in their time together so far, and the duo appear to be more closely matched than ever.

Ferrari ‘headache’ not a problem at all for Fred Vasseur

Now deep into the third season of the Leclerc-Sainz partnership with the Scuderia, each driver has come out on top in the Drivers’ standings one time apiece.

Sainz currently leads Leclerc by 19 points with seven races to go, and the on-track battle between the two at Monza at the start of September was one of the most intense of the season between two team-mates, with both coming through unscathed.

When asked if how evenly-matched his drivers are could be a ‘headache’ for him, Ferrari team principal Vasseur was dismissive about the idea.

“No, not at all. I prefer to have two good ones than two **** ones!” Vasseur quipped to Channel 4 when asked about the potential concern of having two ‘number one’ drivers in the team.

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Sainz drove an excellent race to hold off Lando Norris and two charging Mercedes drivers to hold onto victory in Singapore over the weekend, with Leclerc playing a role in helping his team-mate maintain the lead in the early stages.

With Ferrari coming away with a valuable result from Singapore after a podium at Monza the race before, Vasseur wants to keep a lid on expectations after two strong race weekends for the Scuderia.

“I think we don’t have to draw a negative conclusion when we had a tough weekend and we are not World Champions today,” Vasseur explained.

“We did two weekends in a row in a good shape with two different tracks with a very high-speed track in Monza and a low-speed track in Singapore, but Suzuka will be another one.

“That means that the most important thing will be to be focused on Suzuka and not to consider that we are World Champions yet.”

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