Nico Rosberg believes that, based purely on competitiveness, Mercedes GP will "struggle" to make it onto the podium in this season's final six events.
Despite winning last year's titles under the Brawn GP banner, Mercedes GP have failed to launch an attack on this year's trophies, slumping to fourth place in the Constructors' Championship.
Rosberg, though, has proven to be the better of the two Merc drivers, claiming three podium finishes, which had elevated him as high as seventh in the Drivers' standings.
However, in recent weeks, the team has fallen behind the Renault's out on track, resulting in Rosberg losing out to Robert Kubica in Belgium as the Renault driver secured a podium result to Rosberg's P6.
And, unfortunately for the German and his team, Rosberg is predicting that top-three finishes will be out of his reach for the rest of the season, unless something out of the ordinary happens.
"It's definitely becoming more and more difficult because (based on) pure pace we're going to struggle to get a podium I think," Rosberg told ITV.
"But the team is continuing to work and we are still bringing improvements.
"A lot of them also because we need to try and get them to work properly for next year, which is also important.
"So it helps this year and next year. But there's always still going to be opportunities: we have some great races coming up... there's tracks like Singapore where there's always going to be exciting races and a lot of things can happen.
"So it's still a possibility definitely."
