WRC: Rally Japan winner Sebastien Ogier cuts Elfyn Evans’ lead before Saudi Arabia finale

Evans held a 13-point lead over both Ogier and Rovanpera going into the Toyota City-based event.

However, the Finn’s hopes took an early blow, dropping more than five minutes on Friday after damaging his rear suspension in a collision with a barrier.

Evans began slowly, placing sixth on the opening stage, but put together back-to-back stage wins on Friday and a strong Saturday morning sequence to rise up to second just 1.4secs behind leader Ogier.

The Frenchman responded with a dominant performance on Saturday afternoon, which continued as he was also the quickest driver across the final day’s six stages – including adding a further additional five points with victory in the final bonus power stage.

“It’s obviously a perfect result,” said Ogier, who is looking to equal Sebastien Loeb’s record nine world titles.

“It’s been a challenging weekend because after the rain today nothing was certain, it was the start of a new rally this morning.

“Now, let’s go to the next one. This was a perfect weekend for us to come back so close [to Evans] and let’s hope the last one is not a lottery.”

Toyota Gazoo Racing have already secured their fifth consecutive WRC manufacturers’ title and are now guaranteed to take the top three places in the drivers’ championship.

Rovanpera, though, looks destined to finish third in his final rally season before switching to a career in circuit racing.

“Definitely not the weekend we wanted to have but sometimes it’s like this,” said the 25-year-old Finn.

“Just a bit too inconsistent with results this year.”