♋Ferrari chief Mattia Binotto says he views having two top drivers 🎶as a “luxury” amid the latest controversy between Sebastian Vettel and Charles Leclerc in Formula 1’s Russian Grand Prix.

Tensions rose at the Scuderia in Sochi as Vettel igno🐻red team orders to allow polesit๊ter Leclerc back ahead after the Monegasque had let his four-time world champion teammate into the lead at the start of the race.

Leclerc insisted he had followed a pre-race agreement in the team’s bid to try and secure a second consecutive one-two finish, but Vettel wanted to remain ahead. The ꦫGerman ultimately retired🌳 from the race shortly after his first pit stop when he suffered an MGU-K failure.

The incident resulted in a Virtཧual Safety Car period that ironically enabled Mercedes to ta⛦ke advantage as Lewis Hamilton headed an unlikely one-two for the team to land its first win since F1's summer break.

Asked how he will 𓆏deal with having the toughest management job in F1, Binotto replied: “I still ♍believe it is a luxury.

“I still believe it is a luxury 💞because we have two fantastಌic drivers.”

Binotto insisteꦺd both drivers stuck to the team’s pre-race agreement and den♒ied that Ferrari had stopped Leclerc earlier than Vettel to ensure he leapfrogged the German.

“Looking at 🎉the start, our judgement tꦫhat the start went as planned, and therefore we thought it was right to ask Seb to swap the positions,” Binotto explained.

“Eventuall♕y the two drivers may have different opinions by driving the car, but that is something which ✨we may discuss with them.

“We initially asked Seb to give the position back, but fair enough to say at t🎀hat stage in the race that maybe Charles was not close enough, and we would have lost some time on track.

“Later on, Seb was quite fast and gained some track advantage on Charles. So we knew🔴 that we could decide to do it later on.

“The undꦡercut was not for the reason for giving back the position to Charles,” he added.

“T𓆉he undercut was as well because Charles stopped because he had worn tyres, his left-rear was starting to be worn, so it was the right moment for him to pit.

“We knew as well that if we had stopped both oওur cars there, we would have been vulnerable on Safety Cars by giving the lead to Hamilton, so we tried to stay out as much as we could with Seb, simply to protect in case of Safety Cars later in the race.

“Again, Seb’s tyres were worn, it was the right moment to pit. As a matter of fact, Charles was ahead🐈, Seb was behind, but the race was still not over and there would have been plenty of opportunity to decide with them what would have been the best option later on.”