McLaren prematurely announced they had signed Toro Rosso technical director James Key to join the team and sort out the mess that is their tech department, this prompted toy flinging out the pram from Red Bull who insisted he was going nowhere soon.
It is believed Key has an ironclad contract with the energy drinks brigade until 2020 which they are in no rush to break.
But, according to McLaren boss Zak Brown, in an interview with Motorsport-Total, Key will indeed join his team in 2019, "James will be with us next year."
If this is January next year or December was not made clear. Right now what is certain is that Key was marginalised from the Toro Rosso inner sanctum once his intentions to depart the Red Bull-owned team surfaced.
Brown added, "Of course one would rather that James works with us sooner rather than later, we have committed to him because we think he is incredibly talented."
Meanwhile Brown believes that in returnee Pat Fry and Andrea Stella he has safe hands at Woking right now but more is needed, "They work well together. We have to get the right people to the right places now, and that's not going to happen overnight."
"We're looking forward to seeing [Key] but he has not had any input into the 2019 car," explained Brown.
McLaren's ill-timed announcement in July was met with derision by Red Bull consultant Helmut Marko, "He has a long-term contract with Toro Rosso. We had a discussion with Zak, and instead of coming back to us, there was a press release done. So we'll stick to the contract, and McLaren will have to wait for quite a long time."
"Why do we have contracts? We have to analyse the whole situation. As McLaren is making press announcements, we have to look seriously at the legal situation, but it's sure we won't release him earlier," insisted Marko.
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