It would likely be an understatement to say that the Red Bull Racing crew is expecting very little from its RB21 at Bahrain this weekend — and making matters more challenging, Yuki Tsunoda is still finding his footing.

The Japanese driver is in his second Grand Prix as a member of the top Red Bull team, and he’s not happy with his performance just yet.

Yuki Tsunoda pinpoints Red Bull ‘miscommunication’

While Max Verstappen was able to win the Japanese Grand Prix, Red Bull Racing aren’t expecting anything similar this weekend in Bahrain.

The team’s car this season, the RB21, already seems to suffer from chronic tyre degradation problems that see it wearing through its rubber faster than the competition. Sakhir is an abrasive track already, but hot weather conditions are expected to exacerbate the problem.

And on top of that, the team is still helping second driver Yuki Tsunoda find his footing in what is still only his second weekend with the car.

That much has been clear so far in the first two practice sessions at Bahrain. In FP1 — a session that teammate Max Verstappen sat out in order to give Ayuma Iwasa time behind the wheel — Tsunoda netted the ninth-quickest time, a 1:34.484 that left him finishing behind the driver he replaced, Liam Lawson.

FP2 was even more challenging; Tsunoda set the 18th-fastest time, a 1:32.024m that left him well in arrears of the pace set by Verstappen up in seventh.

The new tech at the Bahrain Grand Prix:

👉 Ferrari SF-25 upgrades explained with significant new floor on the list in Bahrain

👉 Uncovered: F1’s latest tech secrets on display at the Bahrain Grand Prix

Speaking to media after FP2, Tsunoda explained what happened in his session, and where he feels things went wrong.

“Bit of learning, I guess,” the Japanese driver admitted.

“It’s a bit different, the set up between the cars, to see how the performance looks like.

“But also, just this session was pretty messy overall, being able to put it all together.

“There was a lot of miscommunication between our side of the garage, on the radio, for example.

“That’s part of the learning process, because it’s still the fifth session from the when I jumped in [to the Red Bull], but was obviously not the finest session.”

Tsunoda didn’t elaborate on what he meant by miscommunications, though radio transcriptions do show him and race engineer Richard Wood having a fairly heated discussion about tyre temperatures, lap time targets, and steering wheel settings.

When asked about his chances for qualifying, Tsunoda did admit to feeling “optimistic,” though perhaps still under pressure.

“I hope it’ll be better. [It] has to be better than this,” he said.

“I’m sure we’re gonna change a lot of things. For now, the team is struggling, but at the same time, I know a lot will come from cleaner operations and everything.

“So that’s kind of freed up time, so I’m still feeling optimistic. But, yeah, it will be hard for now to go through to Q3.”

Read next: Our bold predictions for the Bahrain Grand Prix