“The first person at being not satisfied at the moment is me,” he told
Gazzetta dello Sport. “But don’t worry, I’m putting myself on the line:
Mattiacci is the right choice, we’ll get back to winning ways very soon.
“I’ve decided to go for a young manager I strongly believe in, and on a person
from the Ferrari family, thus avoiding me going around the world looking for
some mercenary.
“Let’s look ahead: we all must roll up our sleeves in order to be competitive
again.”
In Bahrain Ferrari came a distant ninth and 10th. The hope had been that with
new regulations for this year they could capitalise on the opportunity and
emerge from Red Bull’s shadow, but the anticipated step forward has not
materialised. Di Montezemolo even admitted that this year the team are
effectively fighting to be the second best team, given the dominance of
Mercedes.
In the main press conference in Shanghai, Alonso cut a downcast figure.
“I think we need to accept what Stefano decided. For sure it’s not that in
this race we will improve by one second, because I don’t think Stefano was
doing the front wing. We need to try to help – all the team – with the new
people coming in.
“Stefano was a good man first of all. I’m a close friend of him – we ski
together… [But] the results in the sport are important especially for
Ferrari.”