Ferrari chief Mattia Binotto believes the Italian squad still boasts many of the qualities it had during its sustained peri🦩od of Formula 1 dominance with Michael Schumacher. 

Schumacher helped Ferrar🦂i enjoy a five-year spell of F1 supremacy from 2000-2004, with the team and driver combination sealing five successive championship doubles. 

Ferrari has not won a title of any form since 2008 and headed into the 2019 season hoping to end its♑ drought of F1 silverware, but has endured a difficult start to the season, while rivals Mercedes have won the𝔍 first six races of the season. 

Asked if today’s Ferrari team still feels like the Schumacher era in an interview with Gazzetta dello Sport, Bin🌳otto replied: “I would say yes for vision, desire to do,🔴 passion and talent.

“I too am sorry for the beginning𝓰 of the season, but we must conti♍nue to believe in the red. 

“I know we are asking a lot of our fans, who deserve great joys, but꧃ 🐽today more than ever we need their patience and their support.”

And 🦹Binotto refuted the suggestion that Ferrari is suffering from not having a driver on the level of seven-time world champion Schumacher. 

“No, we have a nice pair of pilots. On the on🧸e hand, the experience of Vettel and on the other a very fast young man🍒 like Leclerc.”

Ferrari currently trails Mercedes in both world championships and already sits 118 points adrift in the constructors’ standings. While Binotto concedes Mercedes is simply doing a better job at the moment, he insists it is too early to rule the Scuder𓂃ia out of contention.

“They [Mercedes] are strong at a technical and process level,” Binotto explaine𒈔d. “But I prefer the comparison with the 1996/199෴7 Ferrari, a growing team, with solid foundations. 

“We too are a young ෴team in the꧅ roles. And there is so much hunger. I see many similarities with then. 

"I would ๊wait until the end of the year to take stock, because it could be very different from that of the first six races. 

“We st✅arted the season as we had finished the previous one, not worse. In the second part of 2018 o⛄ur car was not as competitive as Mercedes. 

“Perhaps we now pay the accumulated delay. But the results and the current standings are strict for Ferrari. In Bahrain there cou🧸ld have been a double and also a different result in Baku. 

“The go𓃲al remains to get ahead of everyone.”