Evans snatches late Corsica lead from Neuville

Neuville overhauled Evans on the final of Saturday's action to establish an overnight lead of 4.5 seconds, taking 16s out of his rival in that test alone.

However Evans - boosted by his M-Sport team promising not to sleep overnight in order to optimise his car – was to reverse that trend on Sunday morning.

He took the same 16s out of Neuville on the 31.75 kilometre test to regain the 11.5s advantage he had late on Saturday afternoon.

Evans dominated the stage, taking 8.8s out of Ott Tanak, who he fought with for the lead until Tanak suffered a puncture on his Toyota late on Saturday.

A bemused Neuville admitted he "didn't know" how he dropped so much time to Evans on the Eaux de Zilia stage.

With one stage remaining of the rally, Neuville said all he could do was keep pushing in the power stage.

Citroen's Sebastien Ogier and Dani Sordo began the test separated by just 5.1s in third and fourth, but defending champion Ogier emerged from it with a comfortable 28.1s cushion as Sordo's Hyundai i20 developed brake issues.

Ogier was still slightly uncomfortable with the set-up of his C3 WRC, and admitted "it would be a surprise" for him to win the power stage as he hasn't won a stage all weekend.

Evans's M-Sport team-mate Teemu Suninen lies fifth overall after a fairly anonymous weekend in which he was ordered to finish by the team after crashing out of recent rallies.

The Finn did impress on Sunday morning, dropping 1.6s to the chasing Tanak with the thiurd fastest stage time.

Tanak is down in sixth after his puncture on Saturday afternoon. The Estonian has M-Sport's Suninen in his sights as he looks to salvage as many championship points from the weekend as possible.

Tanak will have his work cut out however, as he trails Suninen by 20.8s.

Citroen's Esapekka Lappi has spent the majority of the Tour of Corsica confused by his pace and the handling of his C3 WRC. He holds seventh, admitting he "probably isn't fast enough" to claim any power stage bonus points in the final stage.

Nine-time champion Sebastien Loeb is eighth overall for Hyundai, setting an identical time to Jari-Matti Latvala through the 19-mile Eaux de Zilia test.

Toyota team-mates Kris Meeke and Latvala prop up the top 10 heading into the final stage of the rally.

Meeke set a leisurely pace through the stage, likely in a bid to save his tyres for the power stage.

His advantage over Latvala, who also completed the test at a "relaxed" pace, is comfortable at just under a minute and a half.