Sebastian Vettel has lauded his pole position at the Singapore Grand Prix as a "fantastic result" that both he and Ferrari have been waiting for.

The German took his first pole position for the Scuderia at the Marina Bay circuit, with championship leader Lewis Hamilton starting down in fifth and Mercedes teammate Nico Rosberg qualifying in sixth.

However, Vettel has admitted that Ferrari need to remain focused, if they are to reach the chequered flag in first place on Sunday.

He told reporters: "Of course there are no points given today, but for the team, for all of us, this is a fantastic result! We had been waiting for so long for this pole to arrive, not just the team, but myself too.

"Now I'm looking forward to the race tomorrow, knowing that it will be very difficult and challenging to master all the conditions that you experience in a race. But we are starting from the perfect spot.

"So we'll have to focus on tomorrow, because so many things can happen on the way to the chequered flag, with the safety car and so on, as we've seen so often in the past. Hopefully we can have the same speed tomorrow, and then it could be a very good day."

Red Bull's Daniel Ricciardo joins Vettel on the front row of the grid, while Ferrari teammate Kimi Raikkonen starts from third.