Yuki Tsunoda demonstrated in his Red Bull debut at Suzuka that he currently is not “good enough” to drive the RB21.

That is the rather blunt verdict issued by Dutch racer turned pundit Tom Coronel, as the run of point-less finishes for the second Red Bull car continues in F1 2025.

Yuki Tsunoda at Red Bull: Up to the task?

Red Bull decided that enough was enough for Liam Lawson after just two rounds of F1 2025, sending him back to the junior Racing Bulls team and calling up Tsunoda in his place to debut at the Japanese Grand Prix in front of his home fans.

And while Tsunoda did improve upon Lawson’s qualifying results – the New Zealander having fallen in Q1 each time and failing to score a point – by making Q2, it nonetheless was a disappointing P15 on the grid only for Tsunoda after a strong start to the race weekend, with P12 his result on Grand Prix Sunday.

That meant the wait goes on for the second Red Bull driver to score a point in F1 2025, despite reigning four-time World Champion Max Verstappen driving his Red Bull RB21 to a shock pole with a new Suzuka lap record, before turning that into a first win of the season.

And Coronel – speaking to RacingNews365 – passed a damning judgement on Tsunoda.

“He is not yet good enough for this car,” Coronel claimed.

“Because otherwise he would have been more forward. Let’s put that first.

“But if you look relative to the whole field, I don’t think he fell through the ice that much.”

However, be that as it may, Coronel stresses: “You have to get points anyway, come on! If the #1 gets first, then you have to get points at least.”

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Reflecting on that first race with Red Bull, Tsunoda said he paid the price for setting his RB21 up for rainy conditions on Sunday at Suzuka, weather which never materialised.

“I feel very frustrated and disappointed not to score points, but it is what it is,” said Tsunoda.

“Next time when I come to my home Grand Prix, I’ll be in a better shape, and hopefully I can aim for more than a top five.

“In terms of setup, it was more towards the rain, which didn’t happen. That was a bit unfortunate.

“I knew it was going to be tough for overtaking, and I was expecting, if the situation like tyre degradation was massive, it could be a really good situation, but degradation was even zero.

“So everything was probably not towards me. But at same time, I learned a lot of things about the car with this decent 52 laps, so I’m excited for the next race.”

He added: “I’m sure if I had another qualifying, it would be a little bit different. It’s too late. I don’t have any more. I just have to do better in the next race.”

And that next race is this weekend’s Bahrain Grand Prix, part two of F1 2025’s first triple-header.

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