McLaren: Raikkonen exit no big damage

After months of speculation, the Finnish driver finally confirmed on Sunday he will switch to the Ferrari team in 2007 to replace Michael Schumacher alongside Felipe Massa.

Raikkonen has been with McLaren for the last five seasons, finishing runner-up in 2003 and 2005 after having won nine Grands Prix.

McLaren have signed world champion Fernando Alonso for next season, but the second seat is still available while the team consider their options, with GP2 champion Lewis Hamilton as the main favourite.

Whitmarsh said that whoever partners Alonso next year will complete a strong enough line-up not to regret Raikkonen's exit.

"I don't think it is a big damage," said Whitmarsh. "You have got to look out there, look at what some of the other drivers are doing. Lewis (Hamilton) has been doing a great job for us, as everyone knows, and is a great talent, and is clearly an option for us.

"That is a very strong line-up if we were to follow that one (Alonso-Hamilton). And with Gary (Paffett) and Pedro (de la Rosa) in the team we have got options, so we have got a strong line-up. Does any team like to lose talent like Kimi Raikkonen? The fact is you don't, but I think we can have a balanced and good team next year.

"We think Kimi is a great driver. We are very pleased to have Fernando in the team and we have a short term mission to win races with Kimi and a medium term mission to go out and beat Kimi with both of our drivers in the team."

Whitmarsh admitted McLaren are very happy to have chosen Alonso, but he refused to compare the Spaniard with Raikkonen.

"Fernando has done a great job as well," he added. "You can never truly compare who is the best driver, who is the more complete driver, who is the quicker driver, they have not raced against each other in the same equipment and they are not destined to for quite a few years to come, but nonetheless it is an interesting one.

"It is not a clear and obvious conclusion, if you were drawing up your dream team, which one would you have. I think we made a decision to commit to Fernando and he made the decision to commit here.

"The extent to which has bought about what has happened, but we don't regret any actions about what happened. We will have an exciting and strong driver line-up next season."