Gary Anderson: McLaren was right to keep Button

McLaren's decision to keep on Jenson Button to partner Fernando Alonso next year is the right one.

During my time on the Formula 1 pitwall, I usually found that young, hungry chargers such as Rubens Barrichello, Eddie Irvine, Ralf Schumacher and Giancarlo Fisichella came up with the goods.

But, given McLaren's need to get the new Honda power unit working, it makes sense to keep on Button, who after all has a lot of experience working with the Japanese during his Honda days. He will be the first to tell you that the Japanese way of doing things can be different.

Button fared well against Hamilton in their time together at McLaren © LAT

Jenson had a strong end to the year, getting regular top-five results in an improving McLaren. And at 34 he's not exactly over the hill.

The key to getting the best out of the new engines (once you've made them run for more than a lap or two without going bang) is getting the software that makes the various parts of the power unit work well together.

Jenson has plenty of experience of giving the kind of precise engine feedback McLaren and Honda will need. Remember how much trouble some engine manufacturers had at the start of the 2014 season? That was with three or four teams doing the work. Honda has just one, and must make that count.

I'm pleased that McLaren has not cast aside Kevin Magnussen, who had a good first season. As you would expect, there were some errors and poor weekends among the high points, but he proved himself to be a driver worthy of a place in F1.

McLaren claims he will be back on the grid in 2016, possibly with a Honda customer team, so he just has to be patient. It might also prove to be a good situation for him to be out of if Honda struggles in 2015. If McLaren has a bad season, it would have been very easy for a young driver such as Magnussen's career to be ruined by it.

I'm sure he doesn't see it that way right now, but he just as to get his head down, do his time in the simulator and make the best of the few chances he gets to drive the car.

In Alonso and Button, McLaren has one of the strongest driver line-ups on the grid. It's rare for two drivers with world championships on their CVs to be put together, and there are already questions about whether Button can live with Alonso.

Those same questions were asked when Button joined Lewis Hamilton at McLaren in 2010, and that didn't turn out badly. But the balance of power between the two could depend on the car.

My biggest concern were I running the team would be that they require very different car characteristics to suit their driving styles. Button needs a car with a very good balance to allow him to carry good mid-corner speed. If the rear is in any way unstable on the way in, that costs him momentum and, if the front end does not turn in well, he can't keep the minimum speed up.

Alonso likes a car with a little understeer. One of the reasons he outperformed Kimi Raikkonen this year was that he overcame the lack of front-end grip of the Ferrari by how he approaches the corner on the brakes. By unsettling the rear, he is able to rotate the car and has that ability to keep the back end under control.

McLaren has committed to two world champions for 2015 © LAT

These are very different driving styles and there will need to be a difference in set-up between the two cars. It should be possible to dial in what a driver prefers, but I'm pretty sure in the end that if McLaren can build a car that suits Button's style of driving, then Alonso will thrive with it - when I say he can drive a car with understeer where some others can't, that is probably because he has had to. I doubt very much if he has ever driven a car with a perfect balance.

On a personal and engineering level, I'm sure that Alonso and Button will work reasonably well together. Jenson has always shown himself to be able to get on with doing his own thing whoever his team-mate is, while Alonso will be happy as long as he has the edge. It's certainly a strong line-up, one that should score plenty of points even if the McLaren is no more competitive than it was this year.

It's also good for F1. With a lot of drives taken up by paying drivers, it's important for the fans that big-name drivers like Button are still on the grid. It would be different if he wasn't performing, but he is and deserves to be there.

Whatever happens, it's going to be great to follow how McLaren, Honda, Alonso and Button get on next year. Expectations are high, and everyone keeps talking up the chances of wins. But I suspect it's not going to be that easy.