Frederic Vasseur has brushed off growing concerns at Ferrari over the apparent breakdown in communication between Lewis Hamilton and his race engineer, Riccardo Adami.
While Charles Leclerc impressed the team with his dominant pace in Monaco, Hamilton trailed well behind. Asked after the race if he knew why the deficit was so large, the seven-time world champion replied bluntly: "Nope. It happens."
But Hamilton's frustrations appeared to centre not just on the car, but on his ongoing struggles to connect with Adami over team radio.
"What do you need from me?" Hamilton asked during the race, finding himself in what he described as "no man's land."
Adami responded with a layered message that included the phrase, "This is our race."
Hamilton later admitted the message left him confused.
"The information wasn't exactly that clear," he said. "I didn't fully understand 'this is our race'. Was I fighting for the next spot ahead? In actual fact when I looked at the data I was nowhere near any of the guys up front.
"I used up my tyres a lot in that moment but I was so far away from them anyway."
It wasn't the only radio misstep of the weekend. In qualifying, Hamilton was penalised for impeding Max Verstappen — the result of Adami telling him the Red Bull driver was "slowing down", which turned out to be inaccurate.
Then, after crossing the finish line on Sunday, Hamilton thanked his mechanics over the radio for repairing damage ahead of qualifying — but got no reply from Adami.
"Are you upset with me or something?" Hamilton asked, but got no immediate answer.
Despite this, Ferrari team principal Vasseur dismissed suggestions of a deeper issue.
"Honestly, it's not a tension that a guy is asking something," he said. "He's between the walls, he's under pressure, he's fighting. When I spoke to him after the race he was not upset."
Others aren't convinced. Former F1 test driver Ho-Pin Tung told Viaplay that Ferrari should consider switching Hamilton's race engineer.
"He (Hamilton) worked with Peter Bonnington for a long time, because the engineer is the most important person in the team for the driver," he said.
"That relationship has to be very good. If not, it simply costs performance."
GT3 driver and fellow Viaplay analyst Indy Dontje was more direct.
"Things weren't going well between Adami and Carlos Sainz either. I think he should go.
"He now has a seven-time world champion in the car, and he expects something from you. Adami just doesn't perform. Hamilton can expect to have the best of the best."
Dontje noted that Ferrari didn't hesitate to make changes on Leclerc's side in the past.
"Vasseur replaced Charles Leclerc's engineer at Ferrari. I don't understand why they don't intervene now. Hamilton should be able to demand that."
