Button hails McLaren's step forward

Although McLaren struggled during winter testing, the British squad raised its game for the Melbourne weekend, with Lewis Hamilton qualifying on the front row.

Button was fourth quickest, and the Briton admitted he was delighted with the step forward taken by McLaren.

"We are very happy with that," said Button after qualifying. "We didn't get the best out of it, but we I think we should all be very happy with the package that we have.

"It's a massive step forward to what we had in testing, so we should all be very pleased with what we've done this weekend.

"It's still in the early state this car, because we haven't done much testing, so for it to be reliable and reasonably quick we should be very happy."

Although Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel took a dominant pole position, Button said it was too early to give up on his chances to win the race.

"I'm really looking forward to the race. I think we can have a good race from fourth. I had a good race from fourth last year. We'll see.

"Sebastian put on a very good lap but we don't know what their race pace is going to be like. We have to be positive and think we can win."