Citroen drivers reckon Petter Solberg could still win Rally New Zealand despite early tyre error

Solberg started Friday morning on hard tyres, but in the largely wet conditions he was a long way off the pace of the soft-shod frontrunners, and currently languishes in seventh place.

Citroen team-mates Hirvonen and Loeb are 3.9 seconds apart at the front of the field after stage four, but Loeb said with the weather expected to fluctuate all weekend, Solberg might not be the only driver losing huge amounts of time by getting tyre tactics wrong.

"He made a mistake with the tyres. We have to be careful because it could easily be us," said Loeb. "It is very difficult to know because the weather is changing a lot."

Hirvonen reckons Solberg could turn the tables later in the rally if other drivers begin running short of soft tyres.

"Don't forget Solberg still has all his allocation of soft tyres and if it pisses it down on Saturday and Sunday then he can steal this time back," Hirvonen suggested.

Solberg was very frustrated by the end of the morning, and hinted that he felt the time deficit might already be too great.

"It was a team decision," he said of the tyre choice. "It's hard to think about making this time back. It was the biggest loop of the really. You can imagine I'm not happy."