The season 2020 is definitely not a pride and joy for Ferrari. With the big struggles regarding their car and the increasingly more tense relationship between the team and Sebastian Vettel, there are definitely many questions of how to, and who could get the Maranello team out of their struggles. Despite their aspirations to fight the Mercedes at the front, they fall into the far-from-the-top 5th place in the constructors championship, behind Red Bull, Racing Point and McLaren. 

But, as believed by Colin Kolles, a man who was involved in teams such as HRT and Spyker (over the years - Jordan, Midland and Force India) as a managing director, and who claims to know Binotto personally, he is not the man that will help Ferrari to get out of current troubles. 

Binotto, who was appointed as the team principal of Ferrari in 2019 after the departure of Maurizio Arrivabene from the team, used to work as a head of the engine department in 2013 before he replaced James Allison in 2016 as the chief technical officer, holding degrees in mechanical engineering and motor vehicle engineering. As Kolles believes, Binotto is “not a boss, but an engineer). 

In an interview with AvD Motorsport Magazin, Kolles said: “Binotto is a very good engineer. But an engineer is not a team boss. From my point of view, an engineer cannot be a team boss either. I know Binotto personally. He is a person who is shaped by numbers and not by feelings. There is no warmth. These engineers do not understand the psychological side.”

Kolles also referenced the current relationship between Ferrari and Sebastian Vettel, after the increasingly more toxic environment started to surface even during the race broadcast. Kolles recalls on the global pandemic used as an a reason for Scuderia’s decision to part ways in Vettel, which also happened at a very bad moment. 

As he says: “The problem is how he (Vettel) was dumped. It was put in the press that Vettel was gambling for a big salary but that never happened. He just got a call with Covid-19 as an excuse. And they announced the separation much too early. That completely destroyed the season for them. But the problems started a few years ago, when Sebastian could have won the World Championship but did not get the team’s full support. When a team wants to become World Champion, it has to have one No 1 driver and that should have been Vettel. Drivers are very sensitive when they feel they are not receiving full support.”

Is there a possibility that in the near future we’ll see a different person on the position of Ferrari’s team principal? Or is Binotto so far safe in his job?