Arrivabene hails ‘perfect combination’

Sebastian Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen are the "perfect combination" to ensure Ferrari returns to the winning ways, that's according to Maurizio Arrivabene.

The new Ferrari team boss's arrival at Maranello has co-incided with that of four-time World Champion Vettel.

The German has moved over from Red Bull Racing to partner Raikkonen in what is a rather formidable partnership at least on paper.

Arrivabene, though, has every confidence in his drivers and believes their personalities – and driving skills – will gel to help Ferrari return to the front of the grid.

"They are two different characters," he told Autosport.

"Kimi the kind of person who doesn't like to talk about stupid things; he likes to talk serious.

"Either you find after a couple of minutes he stops talking and gives you the hand, or after a couple of hours he's hugging you!

"The guys said this is strange. Drivers are strange. But he's a very good guy and a good driver."

As for Vettel, not for the first time Arrivabene has compared the German to his compatriot Michael Schumacher.

"Seb is different – super professional. He reminds me of another German guy… [Schumacher].

"I was impressed with the concentration and how he works on detail on the car. He's taking notes and talking about these notes at the briefings. It's great.

"We have two different drivers but they are both really committed.

"Sebastian is fully integrated into the team, he's 120 per cent part of the family.

"He's also a funny guy. He's a super person with his feet on the ground; very simple but I'm not surprised he won four World titles.

"After Michael, Kimi was the only World Champion for Ferrari.

"We have the perfect combination."