Leclerc confident Ferrari will be more competitive in Bahrain

Sakhir, March 29: Charles Leclerc hopes the Bahrain Grand Prix will see a more competitive package from Ferrari after the surprising display at the Formula One season opener.

Ferrari were the pacesetters during pre-season testing as Sebastian Vettel and new boy Leclerc impressed in Barcelona.

However, at the Australian Grand Prix it was old foes Mercedes who shone as Valtteri Bottas and Lewis Hamilton locked out the front row of the grid.

They maintained that advantage in the race, with Ferrari pushed out of the top three by Max Verstappen in the Red Bull.

Leclerc admits they were not expecting their Melbourne troubles, but hopes they will be pushing the Silver Arrows in Sakhir this weekend.

"Obviously after the Barcelona weekend we expected more, but on the other hand there were a lot of positives to take [from Australia]," the 21-year-old told a media conference.

Here we are! 🇧🇭 #essereFerrari #BahrainGP pic.twitter.com/HVnFwmwJnk

— Scuderia Ferrari (@ScuderiaFerrari) March 28, 2019

"Anyway, Melbourne is not such a representative track on car performance – even though that doesn't mean we are as strong as we want to be.

"But yeah, there is a lot of work to do and I'm pretty confident in the team that we have done the right job in between Melbourne and here to try to improve."

He added: "We expect to be more competitive. I think our package is strong. We have some answers to the lack of performance in Melbourne.

"I don't think we have all of them but we definitely have some answers to it.

"Then we will only see here whether it was only track specific or if there is something else but I am pretty confident in the package we have."