“The car was great though and we both thoroughly enjoyed the experience. I'm really impressed with how fast Stuart adapted to the flat shift and adjusted his driving style to suit the high revving car.”

Jones was also keen to look on the bright side: “I'm disappointed that our rally ended this way but I can't help but draw so many positives from the weekend,” he continued. “The MG Super 2000 Sport is the best handling car I have ever driven. Hopefully we have shown that it has potential and I'm certain that the MG can be comfortably competitive with Group N cars.”

MSD team principal David Whitehead meanwhile was philosophical about how things turned out: “Stuart did a great job and his feedback was really helpful. His two top three times certainly gave us something to cheer about. The power steering problem will be easy to cure. It's inevitable for a brand new car to have teething problems but we've shown it can run at the front,” he concluded.

Jones is now examining his options for next season and an announcement is expected soon.