First drive review: Dacia Sandero 0.9 TCE Laureate

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Flagship version of the Dacia Sandero shows the importance of staying true to your roots. Not bad - but much better, we hope, as a proper 6k car Perhaps the most superfluous first drive review of 2012. Does it really matter how the new Dacia Sandero drives? This is a full-sized five-door supermini, after all, with five seats, four wheels, an engine and a practical boot, thats coming brand new to the UK next January for less than 6000. For those old enough to remember when that seemed a perfectly normal price for a four-metre hatchback, consider this: the list price on an entry-level five-door version of the Vauxhall Corsa, not-so-long ago the most popular car in the Sanderos class in Britain, currently contains five figures. And it starts with a 12. That being the case, you may think, its vastly less important how well the Sandero serves its purpose functionally and dynamically than that it simply performs at all. This is a new breed of supermini, you could say. One that, for the time being, is in a class of one on sheer value for money. If you like a bargain, how could you possibly find fault with a deal like that?