Verstappen 'surprised' with third in Australian Grand Prix qualifying

Max Verstappen was pleasantly surprised to finish third in qualifying for the Australian Grand Prix after experiencing a "tough" opening day of action on Friday.

Verstappen was the early pacesetter at the Albert Park Circuit, but dropped to third after McLaren duo Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri produced strong laps on their final run.

The reigning world champion improved on his final run despite brushing the gravel in the fast chicane at turns nine and 10, but ended up 0.385 seconds adrift of title rival Norris.

Verstappen has won two of the last four Formula One races after failing to win any of the previous 10, but he did not believe he could have beaten the McLarens even with a perfect lap in qualifying.

Asked after qualifying if the car had progressed during the weekend so far, Verstappen said: "Yeah, I think so. We had a bit of a tough start.

"This has never really been a good track to us as well, so it took a bit of time to understand how we can improve the situation, and we did that today.

"Honestly, I'm quite surprised to be sitting here after yesterday. I felt confident, I felt at one with the car.

"Of course, clearly we're still lacking a bit of pace, but overall happy with the laps in qualifying.

"[I] tried to really extract everything, the tyres are quite sensitive around here as well with all these high-speed corners, but I'm happy to be here."

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Pushed further on the improvements that the team had made to the RB21, Verstappen continued: "[We've been] just trying to fine-tune balance.

"The car just came alive a little bit more, so it was in general quite okay to drive, just too slow.

"Today it was a little bit faster but clearly still not fast enough. Still, to be ahead of Ferrari and Mercedes, I think is good for us here."

In terms of the squad's long-run pace looking ahead to Sunday, Verstappen suggested that Red Bull may still be some way off their rivals.

"I don't expect any kind of miracles about it. I think it's okay, but it’s not on the same level [as the others]. I'll just do my best, see what happens tomorrow."

Verstappen's new team-mate, Liam Lawson, endured a nightmare debut for Red Bull after being knocked out of the first qualifying session.

Lawson qualified 18th at Albert Park, meaning he will line up on the second-last row, with only the Haas pairing of Esteban Ocon and Ollie Bearman behind him.

Saturday had already been a difficult day for the new Red Bull driver, with a pneumatic problem with his power unit restricting him to the garage in final practice.

But this was further compounded later in the day when he slid off the track and onto the grass at turn 13 in his final Q1 effort, leaving him no time to regroup and go again.

"The first part of the lap was fine," he said following his early exit. "We were on target, and then I just made a mistake in the last sector.

"I had a big slide through the high-speed and it cooked the tyres. Then, in the last sector, I just had no tyres and I went off.

"Obviously, a silly mistake, so probably one that didn’t need to happen. I think we were in a decent position building up from the lap we were on anyway, so it’s pretty frustrating."