For what was originally sold to the world as a shared seat, it has become increasingly common for Kalle Rovanperä and Sébastien Ogier to compete in the same events in the WRC.

But that is no coincidence, because Toyota has clearly seen how superior Hyundai is on Sunday and has started to abuse the two part-time world champions and their lower starting positions on the opening day to block points for Hyundai.

The problem is that Ott Tänak was still the best in Latvia.

Ogier and Rovanperä clearly prioritised points on Sunday – certainly more so than at the start of the season – purely to help the team rather than themselves, and in fairness Ogier came particularly close. Two tenths was all that Super Sunday decided in Tänak’s favour, but Toyota cannot continue to fall on the wrong side of these narrow margins.

For example, Elfyn Evans made a mistake on the power stage, likely costing him two positions and therefore two points on title rival Thierry Neuville, and Takamoto Katsuta – who started one car behind Neuville – missed out on beating the Belgian by a massive 0.056s, and was uncharacteristically angry at the stop line:

“If I’m not faster than Thierry, I’m not happy. That was my goal today… f***!”

Perhaps Latvia was simply a reflection of Tänak’s brilliance on Sunday, rather than a specific Toyota failure. After all, Toyota has closed its championship gap to Hyundai to just one point.

But the statistics don’t lie. Toyota has won five of eight rallies so far this season, but Hyundai scored 149 points on Sunday to Toyota’s 124. It’s not hard to see where the difference is made.

Championship momentum shifts towards Tänak