Evans wasꦚ in blistering from throughout Friday morning’s opening loop, going fastest on two of the three stages to lead Neuville by 7.9 seconds, w🍃ith title rival and Toyota team-mate Sebastien Ogier a further 4.7 seconds behind in third.

But on this afternoon’sℱ penultimate stage, Neuville inherited top spot by punching in a scratch time to lead by three tenths of a second.

Evans was fortunat♔e to make it t꧟o the end of that same test having experienced what he called “a pretty big moment”.

Taking a cut, the rear of his Yaris supermini broke traction and hit a kerb, with the Welshman admitting he was “a bit tentative” from tꦯhat point onwards.

On the final Friday test, Neuville – who appeared to have finally figured out the understeer issues slowing his i20 Coupe – upped his advantage to seven tenths of a second.

“Let’s♌ say I am feeling more and more comfortable,” the Belgian said. "I’m looking forward to tomorrow because on today’s twisty stages I couldn’t go any faster – I just don’t get the turn in – so we need to ꦜwork on that.

"Tomorrow is a different profile, a bit more flowing, so ho🧔pefully it treats us a bit better,” added the 2019 event wi♈nner.

Third-placed Ogier lost precious tenths of a second across both Friday l🎶oops due to him not being able to get the maximum out of his car on Spain’s fast asphalt roads.

“We have been too slow,” sꦫaid the Frenchman. “I didn’t have enough conf🍌idence in the car to push to the maximum.

"It hasn’t been a really bad dꦗay but at the same time I have always been fighting a bit with🍸 the car and trying to find the perfect set-up for it.”

Home hero Dani Sordo is provisionally fourth in the third Hyund𒐪ai, 10.8 seconds clear of K𓃲alle Rovanpera, followed by the two M-Sport Ford Fiestas of Adrien Fourmaux and Gus Greensmith.

Toyota junior Takamoto Katsuta was the first high-profileꦍ casualty of the day; he crashed into an armco barrier towards the end of the very first stage and blamed the error on him misunderstanding a pace note. The subsequent impact damaged the suspension on his Yaris and he was forced to retire๊.

Katsuta was joined on the side-lines by 2019 World Rally champion Ott Tanak who left the road only a handful of miles into stage four.

The Estonian had previously escaped a 🎃high-speed spin on SS2 when the rear of the car broke free through a pacey rightℱ-hander.

"I hit a tree stump and made quite a bit of damage to the car,” said Tanak. “It was actually quite some impact, so yeah, probably 🤡a bit too much speed, I locked the wheel and, altogether🔯, I couldn’t save it.”

Rally Spain resu🧸mes tomorrow with crews tackling 𒁃a total of seven special stages.