Gabriel Bortoleto has been described as being like Fernando Alonso at Minardi in the sense that it is a quick driver in a slow car.

The Brazilian has yet to score a point this year but his reputation has largely remained unscathed given the lack of pace in the underwhelming Sauber car.

Gabriel Bortoleto compared to Fenrnado Alonso in career start similarity

Bortoleto’s zero points are the exact same as Alonso’s this year and another similarity of the two has been made by former driver Christian Danner.

The German said Bortoleto’s situation wa akin to Alonso’s first season in the sport with Minardi. The future two-time World Champion came 23rd in his first campaign, masking the driver he would go on to become.

“Everyone in F1 deserves to be there,” Danner told Genting Casino. “Anyone in a midfield team would like a better car. I’d like to see someone like Gabriel Bortoleto get a real shot, right now he’s in a car like Fernando Alonso had at Minardi. No one can see how good he is unless they’re on the inside.”

Danner also raised the prospect of how quickly momentum can fall away from a driver, highlighting Franco Colapinto’s dramatic rise and fall last year.

“Young drivers need momentum. When you’re new, if you impress early, you become the ‘flavour of the month’. That gets you noticed,” the 67-year-old Ferman said.

“Take Colapinto, he exploded onto the scene, but after crashing a couple of cars, the hype cooled. That’s how quickly it shifts.
“But I hope someone like Bortoleto gets a real chance.”

Bortoleto has not always had such kind praise though as earlier in the season, Red Bull’s Helmut Marko said the 20-year-old was in the B category of driver.

Bortoleto said shortly after that he wanted to prove Marko wrong.

“I think Helmut is a guy that is for a very long time in F1,” he commented. “He has put a lot of very talented drivers in F1 in the past, but he also put probably more drivers that failed to be in F1.

“I have – to be honest – respect for him, for the achievements with the drivers that he put [in F1]. Max Verstappen, for me, is one of the greatest of the sport.

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“Everyone can have opinions. We live in a free world. I think he has his opinions about me. I think I proved myself to be in F1. I won F3 and F2 as a rookie.

“I’m going to prove him wrong with time. It’s just a matter of time. Nothing I can say to the media right now will change his mind, because he’s just talking and talking.

“The only thing I can do now is head to the track and prove that his argument was wrong. Hopefully, with time, he will admit, ‘OK, my opinion wasn’t right’, and he will regret what he said.

“But I’ve done this in the past as well. I’ve said things probably that I regret and I don’t agree [with] nowadays. It’s normal. I’m not going to make a big thing about it.”

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