No reason for McLaren to be “downbeat” after difficult F1 Bahrain GP

Norris suffered a power unit pneumatic issue that led to six pitstops and his eventual retirement in the closing laps, while team-mate Oscar Piastri retired early with an electrical failure.

However, Norris tried to see the positives, pointing out that he would have scored points had he not had problems.

He started 11th in a race that saw Valtteri Bottas move up from 12th to eighth, and Pierre Gasly charge from 20th and last to claim ninth place.

Asked by Motorsport.com about his role in keeping spirits in the camp up, he said: “It’s very important. It’s part of my job, really. I guess more so now than ever. But there’s no reason why they should be downbeat.

“The main thing is we should have scored points, that was our objective today, with a car we know is not that competitive. The team know that, and if we fix the issue, we should be fine.”

Norris says that the potential to score points should give the team some hope ahead of the next race in Saudi Arabia while it waits for a major upgrade that is due for the fourth race of the season in Azerbaijan.

“Today, we could have boxed already after we had the first problem,” he said. “After they knew I was going to have to box every 10 laps, we knew we were going to be out the race very quickly.

“We still tried to stay in it for as long as possible, so that’s why I only retired with two laps to go. We scored points in the past in Jeddah. There’s no reason why we shouldn’t have scored points today, and that hopefully continues into the next race.

“We’re optimistic, we still believe we can score points with the car we have, which makes us even more optimistic for the later part of the season. And we’ll keep trying.”

Pushed on potential form in the Saudi race, he said: “I have no idea, to be honest. I think maybe a little bit better. I feel like the very low-speed is where we struggle a lot. And there’s less of that in Jeddah. I say that, but I always seem to be wrong. So, it could be the opposite.

He added: “It’s not as bad as everyone expected before the season, and it’s not as bad as everyone was expecting before the test and before the race.

“But like I said, we should have scored points today. Simple as that. That’s what we’ll try to do next time.”