McLaren heads the constructors’ championship from Ferrari with two rounds remaining, the two operations split by just 24 points.

And while they’re both expected to feature towards the top of the timesheets, Mercedes has emerged as a renewed threat.

Dominant in Las Vegas a week ago, cooler conditions in Qatar coupled with good pace in Losail a year ago, have seen the silver squad emerge as an even greater threat.

“Definitely a good one,” Piastri began when asked how great an opportunity Qatar will be to put some points on Ferrari ahead of Abu Dhabi next week.

“I think it’s a circuit that we were strung out last season.

“It’ll be interesting to see who’s quick this weekend. I think Mercedes will definitely be in the picture, for sure.

“Even for us, our car has evolved quite a lot from when we came here last season.

“But I think we’re going into the weekend pretty confident that we can have a good one.

“I mean, hopefully, it’s enough breathing room that we don’t have to worry about Abu Dhabi at all, but we’ll see what our pace is like.”

Even should McLaren be second fastest to Mercedes, it’s not necessarily a bad thing, provided Ferrari is slower than the pair.

While last year’s Qatar Grand Prix proved excessively hot, with drivers struggling to cope with the conditions (and rule changes being implemented off the back of the heat), conditions this year are far cooler.

Temperatures during the day are only forecast to reach the mid-20s, dropping as the sun does as cars head out on track.

“I think for Mercedes it’s probably good news,” Piastri noted of the conditions.

“We’ve seen pretty much everywhere it’s been cold this year, they’ve been probably the quickest.

“Vegas they were definitely quickest; Canada, very, very fast as well, and even Silverstone before it rained.

“It’s probably good news for them.

“For us, I don’t think it changes too much.

“I don’t think in Vegas we struggled necessarily because it was cold, I think we struggled with a few other things.

“The layout of the track is probably no what we would draw if we were designing a track for our car.”

Opening practice for this weekend’s Qatar Grand Prix begins at 16:30 local time on Friday (00:30 AEDT Saturday).