"You have to be very political in your approach": Former Ferrari chairman discloses areas where Mattia Binotto lacks as a team principal

Former Ferrari chairman Luca di Montezemolo believes that Mattia Binotto, currently the team principal of the Scuderia Ferrari F1 Team, is perhaps in the wrong position for the team. He believes that to be a team manager, there is a lot more required than just the mere knowledge of the sport.

"Should the team manager be changed? Who am I to say."

"You need passion and dedication. You need to be present day and night. You have to be very political in your approach to support your team. You have to be strong and keep your squad together."

Montezemolo was appointed as the president of Ferrari following the death of Enzo Ferrari. The entire company was bleeding until Montezemolo brought it back to life through both, road and racing cars. He introduced Jean Todt to the Scuderia and is responsible for the team's first World Championship win in decades. As someone who has spent ample time around cars, what he said about Mattia Binotto is interesting.

He praised Binotto for being responsible towards the team's faults, and believes that Binotto is extremely good for a technical director. He mentioned:

"He (Mattia Binotto) catches the bullets for his people. You have to understand mistakes and then clean them up. Binotto is an excellent technical director, but running Ferrari’s racing department is different."

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Montezemolo believes that Ferrari have built a competitive car this season

Speaking about the team's performance, Luca di Montezemolo mentioned that the car this year is "extremely competitive." Though the team has lost out to Red Bull and is being chased by Mercedes, the Italian businessman also added that looking at other teams' performances wouldn't help with their problems. He believes that F1 is a team sport, and one person alone cannot help win the championships.

"If we only look at what Red Bull Racing or Mercedes-Benz are doing, the problem will not be solved. We have to reinvent ourselves, create a new dynamic. Ferrari have built an extremely competitive car. One person alone does not win World Championship titles. Formula 1 is a team sport."

The Scuderia had a dream start to the season with a 1 - 2 finish in Bahrain plus a fastest lap. They had the dominant hand in the championship and had a fair battle going on with Red Bull.

However, later into the season, Red Bull managed to develop much better than the Scuderia. Along with this, the team also made a handful of strategic errors which led to a major loss of points. On top of this, the reliability during the Spanish Grand Prix & Azerbaijan Grand Prix caused the team to fall behind their competitor. Now they are almost out of hope for the championship as Max Verstappen is dominating the championship table. This has led to speculation of not having Mattia Binotto as the team principal amongst the fans and spectators.

Mattia Binotto, as Montezemolo mentioned, might not be the perfect fit for the team's principal, but he could still help the team greatly with his knowledge and past experience of working with Ferrari. The Italian has been with the team since 1995, and was a perfect fit with the engineering department.