Bottas: Williams "stronger" than Force India, should finish ahead

Valtteri Bottas reckons that, despite Williams' recent slump in form, it is still "stronger" than main rival Force India.

(L to R): Valtteri Bottas, Williams with team mate Felipe Massa, Williams

Valtteri Bottas, Williams FW38 in the pits

Since Canada, which featured the Grove-based team's only podium of the season so far, Williams scored just 15 points, while Force India picked up 29 and is now only 15 off fourth place.

Bottas, however, remains confident that Williams can see off Force India's challenge.

"I think we can definitely can do it. We are a strong team, I feel we're stronger than them, and we should be ahead of them," Bottas said.

"Definitely the goal going into the season was to fight for the top three in the constructors'. Now Red Bull, Ferrari, Mercedes, they are a bit out of reach. Now the new target for the rest of the year is to try and secure fourth. It is still realistic, completely, so we are pushing hard for that."

At the same time, Bottas admitted Williams' pace has not been up to par recently.

"I think we have underperformed a bit in the last few races, we definitely haven't been finishing in the positions that we should be with this car," said the Finn.

"I think some races we've struggled to get 100% out of the package we've had, so that is the first thing, to try and get every single bit of the car we have in every race with every tyre compound. That's got to be the key.

"There's not going to be much development any more with this year's car, which we hope is the same case for all the other teams.

"In that way it could be tricky in places, we know, with not having any updates. Maybe some very small ones, but nothing huge.

"But still I always like to think positive and we have plenty of good tracks for our car, and I think we still have opportunities to have good races. I think for is it is very, very important to be ahead of Force India in the points. I think that's the main goal at this point."

Bottas stressed that tyres have been the key factor impacting the team's roller-coaster form.

"I think we know as a team we haven't been getting 100 percent out of the tyres, for different reasons, sometimes running too hot, running too cold.

"In Hockenheim, with the strategy, our tyre life predictions didn't match the reality, which ruined our race really. So those kinds of things."