Sauber drivers rue tyre tactics after British Grand Prix qualifying disappointment

The duo rejoined the track with intermediate tyres following the red-flag stoppage, but it was soon evident the track was still too wet.

Perez and Kobayashi returned to pits to change tyres, but only had time to complete only flying lap with full wets.

Kobayashi finished in 12th position.

"We started on intermediate tyres after the break and this proved to be the wrong decision," said Kobayashi. "I pitted and changed to rain tyres, but then I only had time for one flying lap and in the difficult conditions this wasn't enough to improve as much as I needed to make it into Q3.

"Before that we had a very good chance of fighting for a top position. Our pace was really good in the wet. It is a missed opportunity.

"For tomorrow's race I don't really care whether it's wet or dry. I'll be starting a long way down the grid and will fight as hard as I can."

Perez, who qualified in 17th place, also believes the decision to use intermediates was wrong, but said traffic cost him extra time too.

"We made the wrong decision when we went for intermediates instead of rain tyres after the break, but I also had traffic," he said.

"I was driving behind Daniel Ricciardo and could hardly see anything. It is such a shame because we clearly had the pace to fight for a top position here. However, we made a mistake and now have to try hard to recover from that in the race."