Ferrari "not deluded" by Mercedes Baku struggles - Mekies

Ferrari sporting director Laurent Mekies claims the team will not be "deluded" by its promising start to the Azerbaijan Grand Prix weekend with the Scuderia appearing to be second-best behind only Red Bull.

When Friday practice drew to a close, Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc sat third and fourth on the timesheets whilst Mercedes drivers Lewis Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas languished in P11 and P16 respectively.

The form continued in final practice with Ferrari fourth and fifth and although Bottas wound up 13th, Hamilton provided some optimism for Mercedes by slotting into third with a slipstream-assisted effort

“We think of course Red Bull will be very, very strong," Mekies explained. "They are not the target this weekend.

"We have no doubt that Mercedes will be back up there so we are not deluded by this classification. I think what we are looking [for] is to be best of the rest right now.

“So there is a lot of good guys fighting for that position at the moment, the two McLaren’s which we anticipated will be very strong here.

"We still think they will be very strong here but there are many, many cars that are targeting that position but that is what we are trying to get.

“So a P5 or a P4 is probably the best positions we could have.”

Ferrari 'not able to challenge for pole'

Two weeks ago at Monaco, Leclerc secured Ferrari's first pole position since the 2019 Mexican Grand Prix but failed to start the race after damage sustained in a crash only became evident on his lap to the grid.

Despite the team's elevated practice classification, Mekies maintained the team is not in the hunt for pole position.

He added: “We have said it before, it is not a track where we are going to be able to challenge for pole as we have done two weeks ago so we are ready for the hard battle against the midfield.”

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