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Vettel left searching for answers after disappointing qualifying

17:00, 15 Sep 2018

byJake Williams-Smith

Sebastian Vettel and Ferrari will line-up from third on the grid after championship rival Lewis Hamilton surprised everyone with a pole lap that scorched the timing sheets. Vettel couldn't get close to his rival ending up 0.6s adrift of pole and reflecting on another opportunity missed in the title fight.

Vettel had asked his Ferrari mechanics to follow what Mercedes were doing ahead of his final run having been fed out into traffic on his first run. Despite running operations and driving the car, Vettel couldn't improve and starts a lowly third on a track that had looked to be Ferrari territory coming into qualifying.

Speaking on the grid after qualifying concluded, Vettel admitted that the session was not a clean one and that there were questions that needed answering ahead of a tough race tomorrow from the second row.

"It's not ideal. We wanted to get pole, we didn't," Vettel explained. "For us it was a bit of a messy qualifying session. At the end there was too much time missing.

"It's never ideal when you have mini races on the out lap but there were a lot of cars around. I can't blame it on that, in the end we had two laps and they were both not good enough.

"I think we have a good race car. It's a bit more difficult further back but I think we have."

Vettel will also have to contend with Max Verstappen who lines up in second position. The two came to blows last year in Singapore in an incident which effectively ended the German's championship hopes.

Whether Ferrari's race pace can bring them back into the picture remains to be seen but the pace between all of the top teams seems closer than usual this weekend around the Marina Bay circuit.