Such was the scale of Greensmith's crash that the stage was stopped as his Ford Puma lay stricken across the road.<\/p>\n
Greensmith and his co-driver Jonas Andersson escaped uninjured, though the same couldn't be said of their car.<\/p>\n
It's the second straight blow for the Ford team, who on day two had Craig Breen slide out of contention on Friday<\/a> having looked likely to retake the lead of the rally.<\/p>\n "It looks like huge damage, which just goes to show the margins we're on," said Ford team principal Richard Millener.<\/p>\n "Personally, from what I've seen, he comes into that left-hander \u2013 it's harder to see from [the outside] \u2013 but from the in-car, he cuts in too early to the corner, carries too much speed, and understeers off into the bank and then had a massive roll."<\/p>\n While glad to see his two drivers were unharmed, Millener expressed his concern for the state of the car as Rally Catalunya in Spain looms in a little over two weeks' time.<\/p>\n READ MORE:<\/strong> Panthers star sledges Eels ahead of decider<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n READ MORE:<\/strong> When Eels cult hero almost stole a grand final<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n READ MORE:<\/strong> Teenage Socceroo secures dream England move<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n "I have no idea what the car is like, but that could be a tough one for Spain," he said.<\/p>\n "In terms of the impact, it's nothing major at all, just the damage as you can see is fairly severe. That's going to be a challenge."<\/p>\n Even before Saturday's action got underway there was drama as three drivers copped overnight penalties for technical infringements.<\/p>\n https:\/\/twitter.com\/MSportLtd\/status\/1575963224175824896<\/a><\/p>\n That included former rally leader Ott Tanak, who had five seconds added to his time for exceeding the maximum hybrid boost allowed on Special Stage 1 (SS1) of the event.<\/p>\n Hyundai teammate Thierry Neuville was also pinged for the same offence, as was championship leader Kalle Rovanpera of Toyota.<\/p>\n As a result of Tanak's penalty, Evans was promoted to the lead of the rally which by the end of SS8 was out to 2.9 seconds.<\/p>\n However, the tide quickly turned the other way when Evans over-rotated his car and nose-dived an embankment on SS9.<\/p>\n The resulting contact whipped the car around, tearing the front bumper and rear hatch from his Toyota Yaris.<\/p>\n Evans sped to the finish line, but the damage was done \u2013 not only to his car, but his stage time as well.<\/p>\n A 2.9-second advantage soon switched to a 30.4-second deficit to new rally leader Rovanpera, who surged to the lead with a SS9 win.<\/p>\n Tanak, meanwhile, maintained second place just 4.6 seconds adrift of the lead while Sebastien Ogier rose to third, 6.5 seconds in sight of top spot.<\/p>\n Following SS9, Evans and his co-driver Scott Martin pulled over to the side of the road to fix what damage they could to the power unit.<\/p>\n Martin desperately plugged holes with epoxy putty while Evans filled up his CamelBak with water from nearby puddles to replenish the engine's cooling system.<\/p>\n Evans and Martin were fortunate not to lose more time on SS10, which was cancelled after Greensmith's crash.<\/p>\n In the second-tier WRC2 division, hometown hero Hayden Paddon still leads Poland's Kajetan Kajetanowicz\ufeff to the tune of 1:38.0s.<\/p>\n Supercars star Shane van Gisbergen still holds third and is a further 32.8 seconds behind \ufeffKajetanowicz.<\/p>\n A repeat loop of the morning's stages will get underway on Saturday afternoon. Stan Sport will carry SS11 live and ad-free from 11am.<\/p>\n For a daily dose of the best of the breaking news and exclusive content from Wide World of Sports, subscribe to our newsletter by<\/strong><\/em> clicking here<\/strong><\/em><\/a>!<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<\/p>\n
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