WRC Rally Australia: Latvala grabs lead from VW team-mate Ogier

Starting the day just four tenths of a second adrift of Ogier, Latvala took his third stage victory of the rally on SS9, the longest of the rally, by a margin of three seconds from the Frenchman.

That earned the Finn an advantage of 2.4s in the overall standings over the championship leader.

Latvala proceeded to extend his cushion by a further 1.5s on SS10 with another stage win, giving himself a 4.1s lead over Ogier at the end of the morning loop.

Andreas Mikkelsen continues to hold third place, but has fallen away from the lead battle having failed to match the pace of his fellow VW drivers and sits 16.1s adrift of Latvala.

Norwegian driver Mikkelsen briefly lost the final podium place to erstwhile rally leader Kris Meeke after SS9 by just 0.1s, the Citroen driver benefiting from being last of the World Rally Car runners to take to the stage.

Mikkelsen was nonetheless able to wrest the position back from Meeke on the following stage, and the gap between the pair now stands at a slender 0.9s.

Mikko Hirvonen also dropped considerable time relative to the leaders. The M-Sport Ford driver is now 36.4s away from the lead of the rally and holding a lonely fifth place.

The battle for sixth place between Hyundai's Haydon Paddon and Citroen's Mads Ostberg remains close, with only 3.7s separating the pair.

Robert Kubica is a further 47s back in eighth place, comfortably clear of fellow M-Sport driver Elfyn Evans and the Hyundai of Thierry Neuville.

LEADING POSITIONS AFTER SS9: