Charles Leclerc lists three targets he's had since he started his racing career: "Formula 1 was the first dream, the second dream is to be with Ferrari, the last dream is to be world champion." Consensus decrees that, having completed the first objective, the other two will follow in due course.
This is intense expectation to burden the shoulders of a young driver. Kimi Raikkonen's Ferrari future has been the subject of for debate for years, but it is extremely unlikely that Leclerc will vault from his back-of-the-grid current team into the Scuderia after just one season. Not that it will stop people talking about it, or lower the lofty standards by which Leclerc will likely be judged this year.
It feels ludicrous to stress that time should be on the side of a 20-year-old, but sport is cut-throat and F1 is particularly unforgiving. In the eyes of many, if you're not great immediately then you're not a great, and, in a way, that makes Leclerc's situation quite rotten.