Lewis Hamilton admits he was expecting Ferrari to find the extra pace to claim pole position for the Italian Grand Prix in qualifying.
The Briton surprised many by setting the initial benchmark in Q3 after the first flying laps but would eventually be overhauled by both Sebastian Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen, with the latter claiming his first pole of the season.
Greeted by a number of boos from the Tifosi in the crowd at Monza, the Mercedes driver ignored the hostile reception as he reflected on the close fight which saw the top three covered by less than two-tenths of a second.
"That was an exciting qualifying session! Congratulations to Ferrari, they did a solid job today," he said.
"It's obviously incredibly close between us but they've had the upper-hand all weekend, but we still gave it everything we can.
"I kind of knew that the Ferraris might just be able to pull out some extra bit of time, but I think second place might have been possible today.
"I lost maybe half a tenth in the last corner and that's the difference between third and second," he claimed. "We gave it everything we could today and will give more tomorrow.
"We've got to fight hard tomorrow. The long-run pace of the Ferraris looked quicker than ours, so it's not going to be easy, that's for sure."
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Despite his fears of a deficit, the reigning world champion insists he is pleased with the job his team has done so far.
"We've squeezed absolutely everything out of the car today," he insisted. "We've improved the car overnight and I'm really happy with where we were today.
"Everyone in the team is working as hard as they can to make the difference."
As the partisan atmosphere continued, it didn't stop the 33-year-old from giving his usual one-liner...
"It's incredibly close as I said, as you can see, which is great for the sport and great to see so many fans here," he added. "Obviously they're all Ferrari fans, but it's still great!"
