Verstappen: It won't be a straight forward Sprint

Verstappen had no answer to Charles Leclerc's devastating qualifying pace around the streets of Baku, and was beaten by the Monegasque in Qualifying on Friday, while he had to settle for third best in the Sprint Shootout as even his teammate Sergio Perez beat him to second behind the #16 Ferrari.

Verstappen's had a messy lap in SQ3, losing the rear of his RB19 several times, and blamed the tyres after the session, as they got overheated.

"Everything was going quite well," he told Sky Sports F1. "I think the pace was good but first lap in SQ3 I had a big moment in five and six and then the tyres are really hot and I had a moment in seven.

"On the big lap with the most grip we had a terrible sector two so that was not fantastic," he lamented.

"We managed to do another lap and not too many people seemed to be able to pull out (more) so I think the pace is good. Bit unfortunate to be P3 but with this heat and how the tyres are behaving.

As for how the Sprint Race might pan out, the Dutchman said: "I don't think it will be a straight forward Sprint. So it's still all to play for."

However, he remained confident in his ability to take the fight to his teammate and Leclerc; he said: "I'm not worried, in the race we can fight."

Verstappen didn't seem to be at ease with his RB19 on qualifying runs, have to work hard to extract pace out of it, but if the pattern we have seen over the first three races persists, the #1 Red Bull will be a monster over a race distance, which set the scene nicely for a fight between Verstappen and Leclerc both in the Sprint Race and Sunday's Grand Prix.