madmark1974 wrote:I know it's not a trusted source, but the Orange homepage has a story about Button being wanted long term by McLaren, which is not really anything we didn't already know, but right at the bottom is this little snippet :
Whether Alonso's potential partnership with Raikkonen even makes one season is still the subject of much speculation with fresh rumours in the Japanese paddock that McLaren are still looking at luring the double
World Champion back to the team in place of Sergio Perez
Here's the link :
http://web.orange.co.uk/article/sports/mclaren_to_make_button_offer
The suggestion that Alonso is being targeted by McLaren has been floating around since Ferrari announced Kimi would be joining them over suggestions that Alonso's relationship with Ferrari is declining and Ferrari's turbo engine is relatively weak.
James Allen has alluded in one or two of his articles, such as his recent comments on Hulkenberg's options, to the possibility of such a deal being lined up for 2015, with the suggestion that it is Honda who are behind the push to sign Alonso in lieu of Perez (with Button being retained, for now, because he is more commercially attractive to Honda's market in Japan and because he is currently beating Perez in the WDC, therefore seemingly ruling out McLaren as an option for Hulkenberg). Honda did supposedly try to hire Alonso in the past to drive for them when they ran their own works team, although he refused that offer in favour of Renault instead, so that might be another reason why some believe that Honda are trying to arrange for Alonso to drive for McLaren.
Similarly, the BBC have suggested at times that McLaren are targeting Alonso, although in their case those comments have mainly come from Benson rather than Eddie Jordan (and given that Jordan has tended to have a better record when calling the moves of the higher profile drivers in the sport, I would be interested in his analysis of the situation).
It is true that Alonso has been cagey in the past about his team mates, not to mention that Alonso has reportedly been frustrated with the team for some time over their chronic development issues (whilst he publicly supported the team in 2012, there were some quieter complaints from him about the fact that the upgrades the team brought to several races, such as Singapore, often failed to work as expected and had to be withdrawn).
However, although the relationship between Alonso and Ferrari may no longer be quite so harmonious, at the same time McLaren's recent track record has been patchy and they've been oft criticised for poor management, strategic issues or poor reliability. Mind you, they seem to be planning to make sizeable changes to the team and the signing of Prodromou for the future is one major attraction.
For what it is worth, I think that, although McLaren may not be entirely satisfied with Perez, that they will stick with him for 2014 - I suspect that most drivers are waiting to see who gains and loses from the technical changes for 2014 and hope to capitalise on the possibilities that could create for the 2014 driver market, which may leave McLaren with few alternatives to Perez.