Leclerc: I'm very frustrated, we make life way too difficult

The Monegasque's anger could be heard over the radio during the qualifying session at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve and he told Sky Sport's television that Ferrari had missed an opportunity.

The team waited too long to put on slick tyres to make the most of a brief window of dry conditions before the rain got heavier.

After the challenging session, Leclerc fumed in the TV pen: "When the track is so dry and we are staying on inter tyres, we are not making our life any easier. We will again discuss this with the team, but we need to do a step forward now because it's not the first time that it happens."

"I had a clear opinion and a clear intuition and we went for something opposite," revealed Leclerc. “Obviously, it's frustrating to accept it first, then you are putting yourself in a very difficult situation from that moment onwards basically it slips away from us.

"We are just making our life way too difficult," lamented Leclerc, who said he had made his position clear to the team and would manage the situation internally.

"Obviously there will be a talk, there will be an analysis and hopefully we will come back stronger from it because it has been quite a few times now. It's a very difficult Saturday and we always are coming into Sunday with a very difficult thing to do.

"Starting P11 it's not going to be easy to come back. So I'm very frustrated," declared the Monegasque, who has yet to win a Grand Prix this season and lies seventh in the 2023 F1 drivers' standings.

Teammate Carlos Sainz, who crashed in final practice, qualified eighth but was handed a three-place grid penalty for impeding Alpine's Pierre Gasly, crowned a thoroughly miserable day for the Reds at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, named after Ferrari's favourite son.