Marchionne: Ferrari 'in right hands' after Allison exit

Sep.4 - Sergio Marchionne has backed Mattia Binotto as the right man to lead Ferrari back to winning.

Appearing at Monza, the Ferrari president commented on the recent departure from Maranello of the highly-respected technical chief James Allison.

"James, I'm sure, had an abundance of knowledge but it was really time to give a jolt to the team," Marchionne is quoted by the Italian press, "even if probably it came a little late.

"We had focused on a single person to be the answer to all our problems but with Mattia we are in the right hands. He has created a great and young team so let's let them work," he said.

"Why Binotto? Because he did a great job on the power unit in 2015 and 2016 and managing is a very precise and delicate process. We have many engineers working on the car and you have to organise them," Marchionne said.

He admitted that 2016 has essentially been a failure.

"We arrived perhaps a little too optimistic in 2016, thinking the car was there but others improved a lot and we stood still.

"But we have not lost too much time: the new engine of 2017 is already on the bench at least in part and I have not the slightest doubt that the car will be there," said Marchionne.

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Leopold

Leopold Pleijsier founded F1-Fansite.com in 2001 and has followed Formula 1 since the early 1980s. He writes about daily F1 news, race weekends, drivers and the sport’s history.

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