Gryazin cranks the pressure on WRC2 leader Rossel

Rossel is hunting back-to-back Croatia victories in his Citroën C3 Rally2 but struggled to come up with a response to the furious pace set by Gryazin throughout the rally’s penultimate day.

Having started with a half-minute lead, Rossel was on the receiving end of several Gryazin blows as the Škoda Fabia RS Rally2 pilot stormed to fastest times on four of the day’s eight stages. He enters Sunday’s finale a mere 11.5sec in the clear.

"The conditions are not the same as yesterday," Rossel said. "It's quite similar to a gravel rally!

“The feeling is quite good when the road is completely dry, but when we have a lot of mud and gravel [from the cuts] it's impossible to drive for me. The rally is not finished - we will see tomorrow."

It was a good day for the Finns as Toksport team-mates Emil Lindholm and Sami Pajari climbed to third and fourth respectively. Their ascent was partly helped by the demise of Nicolas Ciamin, who rolled his Volkswagen Polo in SS13.

Adrien Fourmaux completed the top five in an M-Sport Ford Fiesta ahead of Gus Greensmith, who limped to the finish of SS12 with a puncture.