Despite constantly supporting Alex Albon, it would appear that Red Bull bosses are finally losing patience with the Thai youngster, effectively giving him two races - this weekend's Portuguese Grand Prix and the Emilia Romagna event at Imola - to close the gap to teammate Max Verstappen.

And while, Pierre Gasly might be hoping for a return to the 'big team', Christian Horner reveals that Red Bull is looking outside its driver pool.

"We need two cars closer together in order to fight the Mercedes," said Horner. "I think AlphaTauri are pretty settled with their drivers," he added, the Faenza outfit, which currently runs Gasly and Daniil Kvyat but which is looking to give Japan's Yuki Tsunoda an FP1 outing later in the season.

"Our preference is very much Alex," Horner insisted, "but if we had to look at a different solution, then obviously we would have to look outside of the Red Bull pool of drivers simply because there is not one available that we would look to put in.

"There's some quality drivers, obviously, on the market, that could be unemployed for next year," he added, referring to the likes of Sergio Perez and Nico Hulkenberg.

"We want Alex to claim that seat and basically justify that there is no need to look at any other alternative," Horner continued. "I think everybody in the team wants to see him do that.

"It felt like at Mugello he was starting to turn the corner and so on," he continued, "he's had a couple of difficult weekends, he needs to bounce back here I think and particularly Imola with a strong weekend from start to finish.

"That's our focus, that's our objective, he's a popular member of the team but we need two cars closer together in order to fight the Mercedes and that's what we've got to do, that's our target."

Check out our Saturday gallery from Portimao, here.