Hyundai sporting director Andrew Wheatley has promised an all-or-nothing approach from Thierry Neuville as he leads Acropolis Rally Greece into the final day.
After 13 of the event’s 17 stages, Neuville holds a 4.1 second lead over Toyota driver Sébastien Ogier.
Neuville has led the event since stage four, but his advantage over Ogier has never exceeded 11s. Four demanding stages stand between him and a second victory of the season, which would be another major lift for Hyundai after its struggles in the first half of the season.
It started Acropolis Rally Greece 127 points behind rival Toyota.
“At the moment, the priority is to maximise our points in the championship, because we’re catching up,” Wheatley told DirtFish. “We’re behind so we need every point.”
However that doesn’t mean Neuville will be on a defensive drive settling for second. Quite the opposite.
“There will be no thinking about backing off and finishing second and collecting the points. We need to push and push,” Wheatley added.
Hyundai has it all to gain and nothing to lose
“Tomorrow is interesting because we have two loops and we have the opportunity to have a proper service in the middle of those two loops. So you can be a little bit more tactical with how you manage it.
“For sure, let’s see how it looks after the first two stages tomorrow, but I can’t imagine that we will leave anything to spare for tomorrow afternoon.”
Neuville described his day as “great”, finding particular enjoyment on the penultimate stage of the leg where he outpaced everyone by 7.1s.
“Great to be back on pace, great to have the good feeling and also a car which, honestly, in that stage was just fabulous,” Neuville told DirtFish.
“I was really enjoying the ride, the grip was massive and yeah, I was just smashing it through the corners and everything went perfectly well, super clean and that was a lot of fun.”
On whether he’ll go all-out for victory, Neuville added: “I mean, the victory is important for the team, that’s for sure. It would be good to get for the championship as well, especially with Elfyn [Evans] not scoring so many points right now, but the rally isn’t over. So we will have a chat now.
“Of course, I feel like tomorrow can be an interesting day and we should try to go for it.”
Ogier still not engaged in the fight
Ogier's focus is on himself and staying out of trouble rather than Neuville ahead of him
Ogier has repeatedly stated throughout Acropolis Rally Greece that he is only focused on himself, despite being so close to Neuville on the leaderboard.
“It looks like from outside that we have this close fight,” Ogier told DirtFish, “but the truth is, I think, at least on my side I can only say I just focus on having my rhythm and just try to stay out of trouble which is very difficult.
“You see the amount of issue for people today again it means that some section I’m really <i> backing off trying to survive those, and then when it’s a bit more clean of course trying to push again but it’s very challenging.
“So yeah I’m glad we survived this day pretty well again but it’s another tough one to go.”
There was no bullish victory statement from Ogier, more a reflective tone being pleased to have survived the day without drama.
Looking ahead to Sunday’s final day, he said: “Again it’s going to be very rough, I believe, especially in the second pass. So still a very long way to go, like I said.”
Wheatley believes the event is in for a showdown finish.
“It was fantastic to watch [today],” he said. “It is great to see these cars at the absolute limit of their capability on these stages which are so, so, so tough.
“I think we have a great fight on our hands tomorrow.”
