Lance Stroll has rejected Felipe Massa’s belief that Williams prioritised its financial outlook over driver choice in setting its Formulaꦚ 1 driver li♋ne-up for 2018, saying that all he needs is a competitive car to return back to the points.

Massa was replaced at Williams for 2018 by Sergey Sirotkin, who, like Stroll, brings a co𒀰nsiderable amount of financial support to the team court♔esy of the Russian scheme SMP Racing.

Williams is currently the only team yet to score a point so far this season due to ongoing struggles with its FW41 car, with Massa telling Autosport two weeks ago that he believed its on-track woes weꦦre nꦍot helped by its driver choices.

Asked about Massa’s comments, Stroll hit back by saying he was an even matc𝔉h for the Brazilian duri🅰ng their time as teammates through 2018, instead pinning Williams’ poor form on the underlying issues with the car.

“First of all,꧋ Felipe’s not here. He’s gone, he’s retired,”ܫ Stroll said.

“Last time I checked, I finished one position behind Felipe꧋. 𓆏And not really using Felipe as a reference, using myself as a reference.

“I look at where I was at sta𓂃ges last year when the car could do it. In China I was in Q3. In other races, many races, I was scoring points. It’s not like I know I can’t do it, it’s not possible♌.

“It’s purely at the moment the problem is that with a really competitive and good race, we are P14, P13. Last year, we were comfortably in the points many times𝓰. That’s how I look at it.”

Stro𒁃ll also confirmed he had not been contacted at all by Massa since his departure from Williams at the end of last year.

L𒉰ooking꧋ ahead to this weekend’s Azerbaijan Grand Prix, Stroll remained hopeful of picking up the team’s first points of the year despite the high-speed layout hitting certain weakness of the Williams car.

“There’s no reason why w🐭e can’t score points here in Baku. I don’t think we would come a𝓀nd compete if we didn’t believe that we could,” Stroll said.

“We’ve had a bit of downtime over the last couple of weeks to understand some of our problems. I think coming into this weekend we can take a bit of a different direction with the car and the setup, and hopefully that w🌱ill make things a little bit better.

“Definitely the nature of the circuit is very fast, lots of long straights. Those long straights were 🦹our strength last year. Unfortunately a bit of ᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚa weakness this year.

“We’re aiming to cure some of those problems, and if we can do thaꦡt, I definitely believe we can b🌞e much more competitive."