As if Nissan needed another 'Qashqai killer', here it is. Every new small 4x4 type crossover is yet another little reminder that Nissan started the whole craze, and yet another nice piece of PR for it.
This particular Qashqai killer has an Evo nose - that's the 'jet fighter grille' lest you forget - and will be in showrooms in Spring, after its
Geneva debut in March. Very little is known about how it's set to go about being popular - we haven't even seen the interior yet - but we do know that it will come with an all-new 1.9-litre turbodiesel featuring start-stop, so emissions should be enticingly low.
The quality will have to be better than Mitsubishi's usual fare if it's to make a dent in the sales of strong competition like the aforementioned Nissan, the
Ford Kuga,
VW Tiguan and even the new
Peugeot 3008, which features some unusually splendid cabin flourishes.
The ASX goes on sale in Japan in February as the RVR, though the Euro spec car is different. Both are based on the cX concept that we first saw back in 2008, though as you can see, the production version has been watered down somewhat. We'll find out everything in March in Geneva.
Mark Nichol - 19 Jan 2010