Kimi Antonelli praised for Monaco confidence amid Wolff warning

After Ferrari appeared to be the team to beat on Friday, with Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton topping a session each, Antonelli set the fastest lap in FP3 in Monte Carlo. The championship leader also finished around seven and a half tenths clear of his teammate, George Russell.

Button also believes the Mercedes youngster had a very positive session ahead of qualifying today. "He was on it from the word go," he said on Sky Sports. "I actually saw Kimi at breakfast and he seemed very relaxed. You can see that in his driving, so much confidence."

The Briton then continued, praising Antonelli: "On those new tyres he's got so much confidence into Turn 1 and that carries through the lap."

He later added: "Today is going to be a really good test to see if Kimi can hold it together. We know he has the speed but it's whether you can do that in Q3 because it's easy to tighten up around Monaco."

Reviewing his team's session to Sky Sports, Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff was positive of Antonelli's pace, but also warned the 19-year-old.

"That was a good session for Kimi, fast. Now we just need to continue to build for qualifying. Leclerc’s lap before he made a mistake in Turn 10 was there or thereabout, so it’s still not going to be in the walk in the park but we are very positively surprised," he began.

The Austrian used Antonelli's father as the benchmark in his assessment. "He has been part of making Kimi what he is today, and if the father says that he’s already quite on the limit, that means this and no more! "It’s an experience thing, I hope he can carry that easiness about it into qualifying and have the car fly."

Qualifying begins at 16:00 local time (15:00 GMT) at the Monaco Grand Prix. You can follow the session with GPblog's liveblog here!