Ferrari’s points leader used his late soft tyre run to turn in a 1m19.772s and he ended the session just seven hundredths in front of his likely end-of-season title rival Verstappen.
But as Carlos Sainz and Sergio Perez struggled to match their respective stablemates, the updated Mercedes W13 continued its impressive showing from Friday as George Russell returned third ahead of his seven-time world champion team-mate Lewis Hamilton.
