By Paul Evans

After what looked like a pretty disastrous situation on Friday, Elfyn Evans brought both his mechanical and driving skills to the fore to salvage a good result at Rally Portugal – finishing fifth on the event and moving up to fourth in the FIA World Rally Championship drivers’ standings.

The Dolgellau driver was down in 20th place after his Ford Fiesta WRC came to a halt with a loose throttle pedal connection. It might be an easy push-it-back-in fix, but it’s a devil of a fault to find – and to only lose four minutes was all credit to his problem fixing capabilities.

From then on it was his never give up attitude that paid dividends. He and co-driver Scott Martin started today’s final leg in seventh position, but that became sixth when Esapekka Lappi / Janne Ferme rolled their Citroen C3 WRC. And then Kris Meeke / Seb Marshall gifted Evans another position when they crashed their Toyota Yaris WRC on the final stage.

There were no bonus Power Stage points for Evans, but there was a final stage windfall insofar as he overtakes the hapless Meeke in the standings.

“We made a pretty good start to the weekend. It wasn’t perfect, but the pace was there,” said Evans. “Obviously it was a shame to lose as much time as we did with the issue on Friday, but these things happen. There wasn’t much more we could do after that, and in all fairness fifth place is a lot more than we could have hoped for on Friday evening.”

There is no time to dwell on what could have been in Portugal, as the next round of the WRC, Rally Italy, starts in less than two weeks time in Sardinia.

Rally Portugal – top 5 finishers
1. Ott Tänak / Martin Järveoja (Toyota Yaris WRC) 3:20:22.8
2. Thierry Neuville / Nicolas Gilsoul (Hyundai i20 Coupe WRC) +15.9
3. Sébastien Ogier / Julien Ingrassia (Citroen C3 WRC) +57.1
4. Teemu Suninen / Marko Salminen (Ford Fiesta WRC) +2:41.5
5. Elfyn Evans / Scott Martin (Ford Fiesta WRC) +7:08.3