Mikko Hirvonen has no regrets over unsuccessful Citroen WRC stint

Despite failing to win a round of the World Rally Championship for the first time since 2005 last season, Hirvonen says he learned plenty that will be useful when he is back in a Ford Fiesta in the 2014 season.

"I would never say these two years were a waste of time," he said. "The first year was fantastic, I was second in the championship and as a team we won the drivers' and the manufacturers' championships - and on many rallies we got first and second place.

"As well as that, it was the first time I was really in another team apart from Ford and it gave me a lot of experience of how another team thinks about the car and the sport and everything and that was really valuable."

Hirvonen's only criticism of Citroen came when the team elected to stop the development of the DS3 WRC last year.

"I don't know if things went wrong [with Citroen]. In a way, you can't blame anybody," he said.

"First thing is that Volkswagen joined rallying and they were a step ahead and we were not able to follow.

"Then I made some small mistakes and then we dropped out of the championship fight.

"The only thing I thought was not so good last year is that when we were not in the fight for the championship anymore then we stopped testing and development of the car.

"That was definitely the wrong way to go and it gave me the feeling that rallying is now not the priority for Citroen in the future and I thought: 'OK, it's been a nice two years, I learned a lot and met some good people - but maybe the future is not here.'"