It is my opinion that Mateschitz was hoping that Honda, who have made it very clear recently that they need to supply another Formula 1 team in addition to McLaren, would come along with a big bag of cash as a sponsor or even effectively buy him out of Toro Rosso, or at the very least buy a major share in the operation.
Clearly Honda does not want to re-enter the sport as a team yet again but simply wants to stay as an engine supplier so consequently no deal was done. Mateschitz can probably afford to keep it as the Renault powered junior Red Bull team, as it is now.
Where does all of this now leave the McLaren - Honda partnership?
Well, still a partnership actually as the options for either of them to seek new pastures look like they have finally run out. Honda have nobody, at this time, that wants to run their engines and McLaren have no other engine manufacturer who wants to supply them, save for the very slimmest of chances that Renault may yet be still interested in doing so.
This McLaren/Honda saga has gone on for so long that it has turned into the Formula 1 version of 'The Blah Story' by Nigel Tomm (the longest and most boring novel ever published at 3,277,227 words - mostly 'blah') with screeds of print devoted to the tenuous and fractured relationship epic of three long years.
An awful lot of 'blah' with no result.
The only real option for both operations from now on seems to be "head down, bum up" and get on with it.
I still keep the faith and believe that the combination will come good and that, at some point, the team will be back in a very competitive position in the sport. Just how long that will be is debatable but the marriage, be it now of convenience or true purpose, has no other options but to endure.
I speculate here, as it is not too late in the season for things to change for 2018, but having to endure is also true of their star driver Fernando Alonso.
His options for another drive with a top team have virtually evaporated and I expect there to soon be an announcement that he believes 2018 will be a winning season for the team, so he will stick it out, as long as the word 'sabbatical' does not arise of course.
Therefore the combination for next season is still almost certain to be McLaren - Honda - Alonso - Stoffel Vandoorne, as it is for the current season. Whether the same can be said of the management team remains to be seen.
The Belgian Grand Prix will be a trial for all parties as the circuit demands power, the more the better and the one thing that is sadly lacking with McLaren in performance terms, as it has been for three seasons now, is Honda power, as well as a huge spoonful of reliability. Nowhere near enough of the former and far too much of the latter.
It was back in the Peugeot engine McLaren days that I was stationed alongside the track between the 'Pouhon' and Les Fagnes' corners, at the very furthest point from the pits, while practice and qualifying was on so that I was able to get either of the drivers back to the pits in a hurry when the Peugeot engine expired. That happened with some regularity and always at the most inconvenient place on the long circuit. Of course that was in the days when a spare car, or two, was ready and waiting back in the garage, something not available these days.
It will be interesting to see if there is a member of the McLaren team, on a motorbike, stationed alongside the track somewhere this weekend and if so I hope he does not have a busy weekend.