Jerez FR3.5: Stevens wins, Sainz crowned champion as Merhi crashes

As Stevens and fellow front-row starter Oliver Rowland made clean getaways at the front, Sainz's title was confirmed just seconds later when his only rival, Roberto Merhi, was taken out in a first-corner collision.

Merhi, who had made a good start and was trying to make up ground on the outside approaching Turn 1, was an innocent victim as Will Buller and Marlon Stockinger banged wheels, pitching Buller into Merhi and taking them both into the gravel.

Sainz had a messy first couple of corners as well, making contact with Oscar Tunjo at Turns 1 and 2.

The second impact was bigger than the first as he locked up and hit Tunjo's sidepod, and the incident was placed under investigation by the stewards.

While Sainz spent the rest of the race in ninth, already assured of the title, the excitement came in the battle for the win between Stevens and Rowland.

Stevens was able to manage the gap at around one second to begin with, before Rowland chipped away and got as close as 0.4s with 10 laps to go.

The gap went out to one second again, before Rowland put in a late charge to ramp up the pressure on the leader.

By this time, Rowland's Fortec team-mate Sergey Sirotkin had joined the battle as well, and in the closing stages all three cars were covered by less than one second.

Rowland forced Stevens to defend into the chicane and the final corner on the last lap, and while he was able to get fully alongside into the tight left-hand hairpin, he couldn't make the move stick on the outside.

Stevens held on as they raced to the finish line, taking victory by just 0.078 seconds.

Merhi's retirement from the race means that he now heads Pierre Gasly - who finished sixth after a race-long fight with Beitske Visser - by just three points in the fight to finish second in the championship behind Sainz.

"I want to congratulate everybody on my team for what we have achieved this season," said the champion.

"It has been a very, very good season, and if you told me at the beginning of this year that I would win the championship in this way, winning seven races and enjoying it so much, I wouldn't have believed it.

"Now that we are champions it is time to look back at what we have achieved. I think we left some good results for people to look at, so I am very happy.

"Obviously to score a championship with P9 is not the best, but we can do it like this thanks to all the strong results we've had over the rest of the season."

Sainz was later penalised for his lap one clash with Tunjo, receiving a 25-second penalty which dropped him to 15th in the results.

RESULTS - 27 LAPS: