Alfa Romeo chief Frederic Vasseur has heaped praise upon Formula 1 rookie Zhou Guanyu and hinted at a contract extension for the Chinese racer.
Zhou has scored five points so far in 2022, compared to the 46 earned by his much more experienced team-mate Valtteri Bottas. But that does not tell the full story, as the Chinese racer's maiden season has been marred by no small amount of misfortune.
After scoring his first point on debut, he finished 11th in back-to-back races before a series of DNFs, mostly due to mechanical issues rather than anything he was doing wrong. And the most-high-profile incident was at Silverstone, where Zhou's car was flipped upside down in a huge crash.
His best result of the years was in Canada where he finished eighth, while the 23-year-old has also impressed with some strong performances in qualifying. Despite his bad luck, the results he has managed appear to have convinced his bosses that he deserves his seat.
Vasseur wants to see Zhou score more points for the team between now and the end of the year, but was full of praise for the rookie. "We had some targets at the beginning to go into Q2, to score points in the season and so on, and he is ticking all the boxes," he told Autosport.
"So far he did Q2 at the first race and he scored a point in Bahrain. Then he was able to improve step by step, even though we had on all sides some issues with reliability. We didn't tell him, but I am more than pleased that he scored points in Montreal because he deserved it. And so far he’s doing a perfect job.
"He's doing a perfect job in the car but outside of the car also, because he is a very good team player, a very good teammate. He's always bringing extra motivation to the guys, he has a positive attitude, and this for us is a good push."
Vasseur went on to stress the importance of having "two cars scoring points" as Alfa Romeo look to build on a promising first half of the season. They feel they are still in the battle for fourth place, with McLaren and Alpine 30 points ahead.
As for Zhou's future, the Frenchman added: "Everybody is more than pleased with what he's doing today For me it's a comfortable situation to have a couple of drivers in the pipeline doing good results and so. But Zhou has to be focused on himself and focused on Zhou. I'm more than pleased with the job done."
