Like at Interlagos, Verstappen was well beaten to pole by Ham🌟ilton with the gap at over 0.4s.

Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez failed to get out of Q2 meaning Verstappen will be left to fight the▨ two Mercedes drivers by himse🧜lf.

“I think we are just lacking a bit of💦 pace,” Verstappen said after qualifying. “I think it’s been just a bit more tricky for us.

“In qualifying, you could already clearly see Checo is not even in Q3. So it just shows that we are definitely struggling a bit mor☂e than normal.

“But n▨evertheless, I mean, still second, so it’s all to play for of course.✨ But I wish we could have fought for more.”

Assessing his final lap in Qatar, Verstappen felt his final effort in Q3 was a good lap despite it not being enou😼gh to get within four-tenths of Hamilton.

“It’s been a bit up and down, happy in FP1, then not so happy in FP2 and three, then I was actually happy in quali again but just not quick enough. That sometimes happens. There are a fewജ corners where I would like to go faster, tried everything, just not a lot of extra pace coming.

“The last few races qualifying has been a bit more of 🌟a struggle for us so we definitely of course try and understand and try to be better like we always try and be.

“I thought I had a really good lap and then I heard the difference in lap time and I was a bit wow didn’t even need to risk it then if it was such a bi🍃g gap, nevertheless had fun out there, qualifying has been cool, it’s a really beautiful track and a lot of fun to drive.”

Verstappen has a 14-poin♔t lead over Hamilton going into Sunday’s Qatar Graꦍnd Prix.