Toto Wolff: Mercedes 'lacking pretty much everywhere' in Azerbaijan

Mercedes boss Toto Wolff has said that the car is ‘lacking pretty much everywhere’ after another tough qualifying in Azerbaijan.

The Silver Arrows cars will line up 5th and 7th for tomorrow’s race in Baku with George Russell ahead of Lewis Hamilton.

Alongside them on the other half of the grid will be the two AlphaTauri cars, with both Pierre Gasly (6th) and Yuki Tsunoda (8th) showing good pace all weekend so far.

There’s every chance that they are the highest up drivers Mercedes will be battling with this Sunday afternoon coming, too, with Wolff admitting that the gap to the Red Bull and Ferrari cars up at the front is big:

“I think the position to expect was third quickest. Gasly had some good pace but the gap [to the front four] is big, it’s a long lap time and we are lacking pretty much everywhere,” he said to Sky Sports.

“If you look at it through rose-tinted glasses you can say hopefully four of them in the front crash out in turn one and then you can win the race but on pure pace it’s realistic to finish 5th and 6th.”

Mercedes should be able to battle well to finish with both cars inside the top six, but as Wolff alludes to, it might need some help from those battling for the lead taking one another off if they are to finish any higher.

The top four on the grid have been a class above all weekend, and it’s hard to see any other driver breaking into that quartet on Sunday without the help of incidents.