Ferrari were hoping to be further forward on the grid

After introducing a major upgrade package in the previous Formula 1 race in Barcelona, but that did not seem to work, and they were hoping to optimize their package more this weekend, and while there was some slight improvement, it was not enough.

In Sprint Qualifying, Carlos Sainz was fifth with Charles Leclerc in tenth after failing to set a lap in SQ3 as he ran out of time following an anti-stall issue in the pitlane.

Sainz raced to fifth in the Sprint Race while Leclerc managed only seventh, as both Ferrari cars were beaten by Mercedes.

Qualifying wasn't much better as Sainz was fourth, beaten by George Russell, while Leclerc messed up his final Q3 lap, ending up sixth on the grid.

Speaking in Ferrari's Saturday press release, Vasseur said: "Overall, we have made a small step forward compared to yesterday, but in the end we were hoping to be a bit further forward on the grid. We improved in the last sector but we are still suffering a bit in a couple of corners.

"Carlos drove a solid qualifying and was just a hundredth of a second slower than (George) Russell while Charles was on a good lap, much faster than his previous one, before locking up at turn 4. It was a shame he had to do his first Q3 run on a scrubbed set rather than the on a new one," he added.

As for Sunday's race and based on lessons learned from the Sprint Race, the Frenchman continued: "As for the race, we saw today that DRS trains develop and if you are in the right position in it, then you can gain quite a bit. The counter effect of this is that if you are at the back of that train it’s easy to overheat the tyres and the car in general.

"So a lot will depend on the start and on lap 1, but compared to the Sprint, strategy and pit stops are involved and everyone will play a bit with these factors," Vasseur concluded.

Sainz commented on his day, he said: "It was a more positive day than yesterday: we have gained more speed and made some changes that have definitely helped us overall.

"We are still struggling in fast corners but we are working very hard with the team to understand how to address it. We are where I imagined we could be, but I feel that we are improving and we were very close to P3.

"The goal for tomorrow is clearly the podium: we know it will be difficult, but we will give it our all, as we always do," the Spaniard concluded.

"Today did not go particularly well," Leclerc added. "Our performance in the Sprint race this morning wasn’t great, after which we worked on changing the car set-up looking for those few precious tenths we were lacking both for qualifying and for the race tomorrow. I think that work paid off and we can move up the order tomorrow.

"In Q3, after an encouraging first run on used tyres, I had a good feeling and tried to push as hard as possible. Unfortunately I made a few mistakes in turns 4 and 6 and so I have to start from sixth. But there were some good points today and I believe we can aim for the podium.

"It seems we are working in the right direction and I hope we can do something good in the race," the Monegasque concluded.