In another punt at his team, Stoffel Vandoorne has criticised the lack of development by McLaren this season, suggesting they haven’t moved forward since Australia.
The Belgian is under increasing pressure to perform if he wants to retain his seat in 2019 with junior driver Lando Norris completing another Friday practice outing at Monza and both Force India drivers linked to his seat.
However, offering his own defence, the 26-year-old believes there is little he can do with the car he has following another tough weekend in Spa where he finished last in every session.
“It’s difficult to get a worse weekend. We’ve seen the performance we have is very far away from being good. There’s not really an explanation,” he said of his home Grand Prix a week ago.
“The reality is we haven’t progressed since the start of the year, we haven’t progressed at all compared to the others.
“After winter testing we were promised a lot of developments that never happened. Australia was our best race and ever since we’re just going backwards.”
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Expectations remain low for this weekend in Italy and the recent open criticism of McLaren indicates to some that perhaps Vandoorne knows he is on borrowed team, the man himself disagrees.
“Yes, because things can evolve,” he said on if he thought staying was still possible. “It is not the same person who will design the car in the future.”
This despite his exit possibly coming as soon as Singapore or Sochi with rumours he will be replaced by whoever is ousted at Force India to accommodate Lance Stroll.
