Rosberg: I’ll match Vettel

Rosberg confessed at the weekend that he had found it ‘a bit strange’ that Ferrari rival Fernando Alonso would single out Schumacher – who struggled for much of his off-colour return to the grand prix grid alongside his compatriot at Mercedes last season – rather than double world champions Red Bull Racing as his biggest threat this year, and the 25-year-old German has promised to prove that he remains the better driver of the pair in the Stuttgart camp.

“It may be close between us, and maybe he will beat me, but there’s no way he’s going to put me in the shade,” he asserted, according to German media. “There is no reason why I would be worse than last year – on the contrary, I will be better!”

Nor does the son of 1982 F1 World Champion Keke Rosberg fear his other countryman Vettel, he makes clear, insisting that he and Mercedes will ultimately achieve the same kind of success as did RBR in 2010.

“Where Vettel is now, I’ll get there,” stressed the man with five podium finishes to his name in the top flight but none on the top step. “He has a good team around him in Red Bull, but myself and the whole team at Mercedes are working like crazy to catch up.”