Martin Brundle warns Ferrari against “nuts” decision to sack Fred Vasseur

Martin Brundle has labelled speculation about Frederic Vasseur’s future at Ferrari as “nuts”, saying it should be the “last thing” they do.

Ahead of this weekend’s Canadian Grand Prix, Italian media outlet Corriere della Sera reported that Vasseur is under increasing pressure to keep his job as Ferrari team principal.

Ferrari endurance chief Antonello Coletta has been named as his potential successor.

However, Ferrari have insisted that there’s no truth in the report when approached by Crash.net for a comment.

During media day at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve on Thursday, Vasseur was backed by Lewis Hamilton and teammate Charles Leclerc.

Giving his perspective on the speculation, Brundle thinks it would be wrong to change their team principal again.

“They might well be, but it would be nuts to change Fred Vasseur,” Brundle said ahead of FP1 in Montreal.

“Is he the problem? I don’t think he’s the problem at the moment. The car’s not fast enough. Now that’s a collaboration between everybody in the team. Who would you replace him with?

“A new broom comes in and everybody keeps their head down, start working in silence because you wait and see where they stand with the new boss. It’s the last thing Ferrari need to do at the moment.

“Fred’s got a lot of experience. He can handle the pressure. It’s only a year ago I did an interview with him here and everybody was celebrating what an amazing job he’s done turning Ferrari around.

“They just won Monaco but it didn’t go so well immediately after that. You know what, this is not a Premier League club where you keep changing the managers until eventually you hopefully find one. You can’t do that. It would be nuts.”

Ferrari’s team principal history

Ferrari’s F1 title drought stretches back to 2008 when they beat McLaren to the constructors’ title.

Since then, several different team principals have been unable to take them to title glory.

Stefano Domenicali stepped down as team boss during the early phase of the 2014 season because of a disappointing start.

He was replaced by Marco Mattiacci, who held the role for the remainder of the season.

Maurizio Arrivabene was in charge between 2015 and 2018.

However, failed title bids with Sebastian Vettel led to his departure at the start of 2019.

Mattia Binotto was given until the end of 2022 - but they were no closer to an F1 title.

Ferrari narrowly missed out on the constructors’ championship in 2024, finishing just 14 points behind McLaren.

Vasseur’s leadership has led to Ferrari improving operationally, plus, the

Frenchman played a crucial role in luring Hamilton to Maranello.