Evans and Ogier neck-and-neck in Saudi for WRC title

2 hours ago 9

Elfyn Evans is facing the prospect of narrowly missing out on the World Rally Championship (WRC) title for a fifth time, with Sebastien Ogier establishing a slender advantage at the season-deciding Rally Saudi Arabia.

The 36-year-old Welshman took a three-point lead into the final round of the 14-race calendar, but on current projections he would be one point behind Ogier before final-day bonuses.

Evans lies ninth after seven of 17 stages at the Jeddah-based finale, 40 seconds behind his Toyota team-mate who ended the Thursday afternoon stages in seventh.

However punctures for early leader Martins Sesks and outside title contender Kalle Rovanpera underline the dangers that could yet turn the title race on its head.

"It's pretty tough in there," said Evans, who had the extra challenge of 'sweeping' the road as the first driver on most stages.

"The cleaning on the second pass has been even worse than the first... but we did what we could.

"It's a long way to go and we'll keep doing what we can."

Evans has previously been runner-up in 2020, 2021, 2023 and 2024 and is bidding to become only the third Briton to win the WRC title.

He has lost time to 41-year-old Ogier on every stage so far and is almost a minute and a half behind Adrien Formaux of France, who is the fourth leader of the rally after Ott Tanak, Latvian Sesks and Finland's Sami Pajari, who suffered tyre delamination on stage seven.

Kalle Rovanpera, who could win the championship with a 24-point turnaround, also fell victim to tyre problems, picking up a puncture on stage four.

The Finn is in eighth place, sandwiched between Evans and Frenchman Ogier who is trying to equal Sebastien Loeb's record of nine WRC titles.

Ireland's Josh McErlean is in 12th place, the Ford M-Sport driver climbing back up the leaderboard after losing over two minutes on stage two when he was forced to stop to change a tyre which was debeaded by a rut at a junction.

There is one further stage to come on Thursday evening before the drivers compete over six stages on Friday.

There are then three final stages on Saturday with two sets up to five bonus points available which currently look set to decide the 2025 champion.

1. Adrien Fourmaux (France), Hyundai, 1 hours 14 minutes 54.3 seconds

2. Sami Pajari (Finland), Toyota, +5.3secs

3. Martins Sesks (Latvia), Ford, +8.9secs

4. Ott Tanak (Estonia), Hyundai, +15.2secs

5. Thierry Neuville (Belgium), Hyundai, +16.3secs

6. Takamoto Katsuta (Japan), Toyota, +22.2secs

7. Sebastien Ogier (France), Toyota, +46.2secs

8. Kalle Rovanpera (Finland), Toyota, +1min 22.5secs

9. Elfyn Evans (Great Britain), Toyota, +1min 26.2secs

10. Gregoire Munster (Luxembourg), Ford, +2min 10.4secs