McLaren claims their "plan hasn't changed" in regards to Stoffel Vandoorne, after confirming the Belgian for 2018 ahead of his first home race at Spa-Francorchamps.

After two years in GP2, winning it at the second attempt, and a year as reserve driver last year which saw him make his debut in Bahrain, the 25-year-old finally got a full-time drive with the historic British team this season replacing Jenson Button and was tipped to be one the best young talents to join the grid in quite some time.

But, as Honda's problems with their power unit continued, Vandoorne has struggled to make the impact most were expecting against Fernando Alonso, who, admittedly, has been in the form of his career. 

He has improved as the year has progressed, however, scoring his first points since his first race last year last month in Hungary, and though there was never any suggestion his seat was under threat McLaren did make it official he would be remaining for next season on Wednesday

“When we announced at the end of 2016 that Stoffel would be a McLaren Honda race driver for 2017, we indicated that our plan was that he’d race for us for a number of years,” Racing Director Eric Boullier commented. “That plan hasn’t changed, and I’m very happy therefore to be able to confirm that he’ll continue to race for us next season.”

The former Lotus boss continued by expressing McLaren's continued faith in Vandoorne: “Like all rookies, he’s had to learn a lot in the first half of his first Formula 1 season, but we have great confidence in him, and he’s getting better and better all the time,” he said.

“His team-mate is a tough opponent – that’s an understatement in fact because he’s arguably the best driver in the sport today – but Stoffel’s robust talent and fierce ambition make us sure that he’ll achieve great successes with us in the future.”

Vandoorne himself welcomed the decision stating: “I’m delighted that the team has now formally announced that I will continue to race for them next year because I’ll be able to approach the second half of my rookie season with total focus on the job at hand, namely getting the very most I can out of my car, my engineers, and everything and everyone around me.

“I’ve already learned such a huge amount in the first half of my first season in Formula 1 - from my engineers, from my mechanics, from Eric [Boullier], from Zak [Brown] and from Jonathan [Neale], and also from Fernando [Alonso], who is a brilliant driver and also an excellent teammate.”