Rally Sweden WRC: Commanding lead for Evans ahead of final stage

Elfyn Evans is closing in on his second World Rally Championship win as he leads Rally Sweden by 17.2 seconds to Ott Tanak.

Toyota’s Evans set the fastest time on all three of Saturday morning’s stages and, though he was only fourth on the afternoon’s Torsby Sprint stage, he went quicker than reigning world champion Tanak to extend his advantage further over the Hyundai driver.

If Evans stays ahead on Sunday it will be the Welshman’s first victory since Rally GB in 2017, which he took with the M-Sport Ford team.

Sebastien Ogier and Kalle Rovanpera’s rally-long battle continued on Saturday afternoon’s stage, with Ogier nipping ahead of the youngster once again in the fight for the final podium spot.

The Toyota drivers swapped positions throughout the morning and, though Ogier moved ahead on the Torsby test, he has only a half-second advantage over Rovanpera.

M-Sport’s Esapekka Lappi lost a small amount of time to Thierry Neuville as the Belgian snatched the stage win, but maintains a 4.5s lead over the Hyundai driver.

Craig Breen and Teemu Suninen remain in seventh and eighth after the short but muddy spectator stage.

The cars remained on studded tyres despite the lack of snow on the stage due to the unusually warm weather conditions.

Sunday’s final day will comprise only one stage, the Likenas powerstage, as the first running of the stage was cancelled in order to preserve the increasingly muddy road.

Takamoto Katsuta is last of the WRC competitors in his Toyota, while Juri Huttenen remains WRC3 leader ahead of Emil Lindholm.

WRC2 is headed up by Mads Ostberg in 12th.

Leading positions after eight stages