Raikkonen believes he would have won

The Finn put Alonso under pressure for most of the race and appeared to be in control of the situation, having stopped longer than Alonso at the first round of stops.

But when the safety car was called out to allow Mark Webber's stranded Williams to be cleared, that meant his strategy advantage was instantly wiped out - before a heat shield failure put him out of the race completely.

"Things just didn't go my way today," he said. "Our strategy would probably have meant that I would have been able to take the lead after the second series of pitstops, but we really lost out when the safety car came out.

"Then there was a small fire caused by a heat shield which damaged a wiring loom and that was the end of the race for me. It's always disappointing to retire both for me and the team, but it's particularly hard when you all know that you are in with a good chance to win.

"However we have made progress, and the car was really competitive today, and we aim to do well at Silverstone."

Juan Pablo Montoya made up for some of Raikkonen's disappointment as he took second place, although he never appeared to have the pace to beat Alonso.

"I'm pleased with today's result as it's a reward for everybody at McLaren and Mercedes who have been working hard for the past couple of weeks to improve our competitiveness," said the Colombian.

"As is often the case in Monaco I really struggled with traffic and lost too much time to Fernando to be able to mount a challenge when I had a clear track ahead of me.

"The car was good, and I think we could have won today if things had gone our way. However Monaco is such an unpredictable race where you have to be in the right place at the right time. We now want to work hard to continue our progress. There is still some