94: Renault Captur – confounds crossover issues by actually being a rather nice car

As we so often note, the small crossover category is replete with cars that are just not worth the bother. Small, less practical than a traditional hatch, over-priced, and under-engineered, most of them are actually best avoided.

The Renault Captur confounds all that by actually being a rather nice car. It's been on sale a good while now, and has usually been found lurking near the top of the sales charts for this class, and frankly we can see why. It's reasonably roomy, has a pleasant, mostly well-made interior, looks nice on the outside and is actually not half bad to drive.

There’s a smooth, well-controlled ride quality, and if the steering hand handling hardly encourage you to push it hard on a country road, then at least the 900cc turbo petrol engine is enthusiastic, and frugal with it. It’s true - small crossovers are generally awful, but if you must have one, you can do a lot worse than this.

Best model: Captur TCe 90 GT-Line for €23,990