Perez was sent out ahead of Verstappen in Q2 and Q3 to provide the championship leader with a tow, and his aid ultimately proved crucial to the Dutchman securing 𝄹third behind the two Mercedes drivers.

Verstappen ended up four-tenths off the pace of Valtteri Bottas as Red Bull struggled to match its main rival at Monza but he was able to narrowly pip the McLaren duo Lando Norris and Daniel Ricciar🐻do by just 0.023s.

Having effectively sacrificed his own resul🌠t, Perez finished six tenths down on Verstappen and will line-up for Saturday’s sprint race from ninth on the grid.

"I have to say, Checo played a key role a🐭s a team player today to give his team-mate a tow and help Max get into that position, because I think we were vulnerable to the McLarens,” Horner told Sky Sports.

"Max up there in P3, Checo probably sacrificed half a second. So, he should have been high𓆏er than where he is, but we were pret꧑ty happy with that result.

"To beꦓ honest, I think based on what the deficit was last year, we pretty 🀅much halved that gap.”

Horner admitted Perez almost failed to progress to Q3 altogether due to the assistance he wa✅s giving Verstappen in Q2.

“𓆏He was tumbling dow💜n the order,” Horner added. “So it was a little bit nip and tuck in Q2, but thankfully he’d just done enough.”

Perez said he ho🅺pes Red Bull’s set-up꧋ choice will play dividends and “pay us back” on Sunday.

“We were struggling there, we're really low on downforce,” Th🧔e Mexican explained.

"Just trying to optimise the Sunday, so hopefully that can pay us back and then tomorrow in the sprint race, hopefully we𝔉 can make up some positions and come through the field. The long run looks promising.

"The sprint will be quite hard, because it will be a DRS train very early on, but it's a long race and😼 a lot of thin🐠gs can happen tomorrow."