Stefano Domenicali - Photo Credit: Scuderia Ferrari
Ferrari's Team Principal, Stefano Domenicali, has asked the legions of Ferrari supporters to be patient as the team looks to move up the grid. Fernando Alonso and Felipe Massa qualified 12th and 16th for tomorrow's Australian Grand Prix, confirming the team's worst fears after a turbulent pre-season.
Domenicali admits he can understand the disappointment of the 'tifosi' but panicking is not the way to rectify things, and insists the team must stay calm.
“We can only be disappointed after this qualifying session. It hurts to have neither driver on track for the final part of the session, even if we know that Fernando had every chance of getting at least this far if he had not got caught up in one of those incidents that are part of the game. Felipe was struggling with the balance of the car right from the morning and we need to look at it in depth to work out why. Everyone had been waiting for this hour of qualifying to understand what the pecking order would be: we knew it would be tough for us and that's how it went. I understand that at the moment, our fans are disappointed, but I would urge them to be cautious before making any definitive judgement, as if everything was already over. We need to remain calm and concentrated.”
“We have a lot of work to do and our engineers are well aware of that, as indeed they were before even leaving for Melbourne. The season is going to be very long, just as tomorrow's race will be long and hard. Given our grid positions, the realistic aim is for us to get both cars into the points. As usual, we will do our utmost.”
