Latvala: Rovanpera Portugal WRC victory reminiscent of a dominant Sebastien Ogier

Rovanpera produced a masterclass display on Portugal’s tricky gravel stages to requirement a fifth career WRC win and his third subsequent triumph pursuit success on snow in Sweden and Croatia’s tarmac stages.

Expectations of victory were tempered heading into Portugal given the Finn faced the tough task of opening the dusty gravel roads on Friday virtue of stuff the championship leader.

However, the 21-year-old coped admirably as road sweeper ending Friday second overall 13.6s overdue Toyota team-mate Elfyn Evans.

Rovanpera was then worldly-wise to venery lanugo Evans on Saturday surpassing going on to record 15.2s victory on Sunday, including a final power stage win to requirement a perfect 30 points from the weekend.

This is the second event in succession where Rovanpera has won stuff first on the road, which prompted Latvala to compare his young suburbanite to Ogier, a proven master at road sweeping during his run to eight world titles.

Ironically this weekend ultimately proved a difficult weekend for Ogier on his WRC return with Toyota, without a double puncture on Friday and an uncharacteristic crash on Saturday.

“Once then he [Kalle] has surprised us considering we didn’t expect him to win, as he was first car on the road, but he did it,” Latvala told Autosport.

“Elfyn was driving really well fighting for the victory and putting the pressure on Kalle, but this time Kalle found increasingly performance.

\"It [Kalle’s victory in Portugal] reminds me of the dominance of Sebastien Ogier when in the 2013 when he was driving the Volkswagen for the first time [when he won his first title].

Kalle Rovanperä, Jonne Halttunen, Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT Toyota GR Yaris Rally1

Photo by: Toyota Racing

“He was putting all the other drivers under pressure and Kalle has now washed-up the same and it very difficult when a suburbanite is in what I undeniability the spritz zone. It is very difficult for the others to write-up him and he has found that.

“For Kalle all of the things are clicking together he stays wifely and doesn’t take too much pressure and the car is suing him really well.

“What I see in Kalle, is there is nobody in history at his age that has washed-up this,” Latvala added.

“We know that we had unconfined drivers in the past, Sebastien Loeb, Sebastien Ogier and they were good drivers and can win rallies by opening the road. But nobody has washed-up it the age where Kalle is now. We haven’t seen that in rally history.”

Responding to Latvala’s comments, Rovanpera told Autosport: “Of undertow it is a good thing to know you can do this considering that is something you need to fight for a championship.

\"Of undertow it [being compared to Ogier] ways something, it is nice but we still have a long way to have the same achievements as him.

“I have really good feelings [about this win]. I am bit surprised moreover as I didn’t really think when we started the rally we could do something like this.”

This latest success has left Latvala to suggest that Rovanpera, who leads the championship by 46 points from Hyundai’s Thierry Neuville, has all the “elements” required to wilt a world champion.

“Kalle has grown up now really quickly and he has shown and proven that he has all the elements to wilt a world champion,\" Latvala said. “He is on the right path but for sure there are many races and many increasingly points to be scored surpassing you are there.”