Ferrari chiefs return for crisis over team's poor

It is the second consecutive season that the team’s senior management have opted to return to Italy between back-to-back grands prix on the other side of the globe – Malaysia will host the second race of the season this weekend after Jenson Button’s victory in Melbourne on Sunday. “There is no time to lose as there’s a pressing need to push flat-out on the development of the F2012,” the Italian team explained on their website yesterday. Fernando Alonso’s fifth-place finish in Australia exceeded the team’s expectations after a dreadful Saturday in which neither he nor team-mate Felipe Massa made it to the third part of qualifying. Alonso’s spin in Q2 was representative of the F2012’s handling characteristicsand only his brilliance at wrestling a skittish car around Albert Park got Ferrari out of jail. Certainly Felipe Massa never got to grips with the car. The Brazilian had a truly appalling weekend, retiring from 13th place after a collision with Williams’s Bruno Senna. “It couldn’t have gone any worse,” he said.