Ferrari’s 2022 season could have, and maybe should have been one for the history books, as the Scuderia got off to a flying start in Bahrain, easily boasting the fastest car on the grid and bringing home a one-two finish.
Charles Leclerc looked the favourite to beat Max Verstappen to the drivers’ championship, while faltering Mercedes and Red Bull teams made the constructors’ championship look like an attainable target for Ferrari.
By the time the season reached its conclusion in Abu Dhabi, Leclerc had just about managed to scrape a second-place finish ahead of Sergio Perez, while Red Bull had created a stunning gap of over 200 points between themselves and runners up Ferrari.
It all went wrong for the team because of bizarre strategy calls and reliability issues, with Mattia Binotto admitting that they had to tone down the power of their engine to stop the onslaught of race retirements.
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With Ferrari’s poor decision-making during races over the course of the season costing their drivers multiple race wins, some fans have claimed that replacing Binotto with Fred Vasseur is only going to have a small impact, as the roots of the problems lie with the strategy team.
With this in mind, former F1 driver Ralf Schumacher has suggested that Vasseur will look to overhaul his team at Ferrari, leading to a complete backroom restructure under the Frenchman’s rule.
“Fred will have credit for now and the question will be who he can bring with him,” said the German.
“He will definitely take some confidants from Sauber to Ferrari because there will also be some restructuring there.”
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F1 boss Stefano Domenicali has claimed that although Binotto did a reasonable job during his time as Ferrari team principal, second place is not good enough for the Scuderia.
This means that expectations will be high for Vasseur right off the bat when he joins Ferrari in the new year, with the Frenchman already being warned by his current employers of Ferrari’s sacking culture, with only three team principals managing to last more than three years in the hotseat.
Having not won the constructors’ championship since 2008, the major regulation changes that came with the start of the 2022 season will provide the team with a chance to get back to winning ways, as a new era provides new opportunities.