Both McLaren drivers were surprised to have qualified behind the Ferraris, as the pace showed in the earlier practice session had been incredibly strong, with Lando Norris in P2 after the second session.

However, tomorrow his teammate Daniel Ricciardo will start ahead of him in P6, moving up a position after the five grid place drop Valtteri Bottas got for his new combustion engine, and is ready to fight for points with Ferrari.

The Australian said he had the best feeling with the car and the tyres in the first part of qualifying:

"Q1 was probably the best lap of the session. It was where I felt probably the most comfortable. The medium, I didn’t feel that great. It was a little hairy, although I’m happy to start the race on that tyre, but on one lap I didn’t really get comfort on that. Then back to the softs in Q3 was better."

Ricciardo went on to talk about the track conditions, which didn't build up like the team had planned:

"I don’t think the track improved that much as the session went on. So, I felt like I was fighting it a little more. The last lap was okay, considering it was hard to do a perfect lap with the conditions, so it was clean enough – I don’t think there were two or three tenths in it."

While he feels extremely close to one of the Ferrari drivers, he reckons it'll be harder to reach Leclerc, but the fight for third place in the constructor's championship is definitely still on, and both McLaren drivers look forward to try and increase their eight points advantage over the Italian team:

"So very close to Carlos, when the gap’s that small that’s definitely achievable but I think Charles was maybe two tenths up the road and I don’t think we had that in Q3. I want to say obviously we want to be ahead but we’re close enough to not be discouraged, and we’ll be the hunters tomorrow.”