Mercedes GP managing director Nick Fry believes that his former colleague Jenson Button will be hurting after being comprehensively outpaced by new team-mate Lewis Hamilton in last weekend's Bahrain GP.
Button, who quite Brawn (now Mercedes) for McLaren during the off-season, could only manage seventh place at Sakhir while the man he succeeded as world champion last year came home in a highly creditable third.
According to Fry, Button will now be desperate to turn things around in Melbourne on Sunday week.
"There's clearly a gap that Jenson is going to have to close," the Mercedes CEO told Reuters. "It's absolutely self-evident. I'm sure he'll be looking after this weekend at what he can do to close the gap to Lewis. Lewis does have 'home team advantage' at the moment, but the longer Jenson stays with the team, the more that reason goes away.
"He'll have to be looking at all the aspects of his own performance - not only how he drives, but also the way he works with the team. Jenson will know all those things, and he's got to work hard."