Ferrari insider Leo Turrini has reported engineers are unimpressed by early performance indicators from the 2020 car.

Set to be unveiled on February 11th, speculation has suggested the Italian team is substantially altering its design compared to last year, which struggled for downforce compared to Mercedes and Red Bull.

But as the Scuderia harbours ambitions of ending their 12-year wait for any Formula 1 championship, the early noises coming from Maranello are not good.

“It seems to me that, so far, the indications from the simulator and the wind tunnel have not impressed the engineers,” Turrini, a well-respected journalist known to have close ties to Ferrari, said in his Quotidiano blog.

“But keep in mind that there is still time.”

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In recent years, Ferrari has become known for running well in pre-season testing and in 2017 and 2018 carried that performance for the first half of the year before tapering off after the summer break.

Last year, a somewhat dominant eight days in Barcelona proved very wrong as the team finished 50 seconds behind race winner Valtteri Bottas in Australia.

So perhaps then to hear of concerns now could be reassuring to some fans that it will trigger a development spurt that puts the team in a stronger position.

Another huge story heading into 2020 also revolves around the future of Sebastian Vettel, with his contract expiring and Lewis Hamilton being linked to his seat for 2021.

“I’m not so sure that 2020 will be Vettel’s last year in red, all the more so after Verstappen extended at Red Bull,” Turrini claimed.

“Vettel is not the least bit affected by the hostility of the Italian media, for the simple reason that he does not read much of it.”