Oscar Piastri has pointed to his qualifying performance as the reason he missed out on a podium in the Dutch Grand Prix.

The Australian started third but a sluggish start saw him slip behind George Russell at the opening corner.

He spent the entirety of the opening stint tucked up behind the Mercedes, finally clearing him courtesy of a healthy tyre advantage following his own stop.

In the pit stop cycle, Charles Leclerc had also got ahead of Piastri, the Ferrari driver proving impervious in the latter stages, leaving Piastri fourth at the chequered flag.

“That’s one part of the puzzle,” Piastri acknowledged when asked if falling behind Russell was the key factor in his race.

“Realistically, it started with qualifying, just not being competitive enough when it mattered.

“The start obviously didn’t help things, it just kind of boxed us in a little bit.

“I think the pace in clean air was quite strong and clearly the car was quick today.

“Just I spent about 60 of the 70 laps within a second of the car in front, so that made life pretty painful.”

Piastri pitted eight laps after Russell, and nine laps later than Leclerc, emerging from the lane behind the pair.

He quickly caught and passed Russell for fourth, and soon reeled in the Ferrari ahead, where his challenge was blunted.

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“Even in the first stint, it wasn’t straightforward to keep Leclerc behind,” Piastri said of the Ferrari’s pace.

“Then in the second stint, it was a bit stronger than I expected.

“A little bit surprising. Days like this happen with these cars, it seems.

“Even for ourselves, there’s been a few races like that, and some races where it can be the opposite as well, where you have a really strong Saturday and then Sunday it’s just not quite the same.”

McLaren introduced a sizeable upgrade package in Zandvoort, which helped Norris win the race by more than 20 seconds.

He too had a slow getaway, falling behind Max Verstappen off the line, but able to reel the Red Bull Racing driver back in to pass and pull clear before the pit stop window opened.

While Piastri didn’t enjoy that level of performance, his lap times did at match his race-winning team-mate when opportunity allowed.

“There was definitely moments of the weekend where I felt very strong and very comfortable,” the 23-year-old said.

“Friday was pretty strong, especially over one lap. Even qualifying was looking very strong, just I didn’t find enough on the last lap of qualifying and then that made life a bit more painful.

“Accompanied by a bad start today, it really kind of set the tone for the afternoon.

“When your team-mate wins by 20 seconds, clearly there’s things to work on and improve, so I’ll try and make sure that I’m back in the game next weekend.”