Hyundai team-mates will be free to battle for the WRC championship in the Japan finale
Ott Tanak will be allowed to battle “without his hands tied” at the World Rally Championship title-deciding Rally Japan, according to Hyundai team principal Cyril Abiteboul.
Both the drivers' and manufacturers’ titles will go down to the wire on Japan's asphalt stages this weekend, with the former to be disputed between Hyundai team-mates Thierry Neuville and Tanak.
Neuville leads 2019 winner Tanak by 25 points and is the frontrunner to earn his maiden global championship, with the Belgian just having to score six points to secure the coveted crown. It will be the first time Hyundai has steered a driver to the world championship.
While Tanak’s prospects of earning a second title are remote, Abiteboul insists his drivers are free to combat each other.
But the Frenchman has highlighted a necessity for Hyundai to preserve its edge over Toyota, which presently stands at 15 points, to secure a first manufacturers’ crown since 2020.
“I think Thierry, and we can all understand him, he will naturally take a fairly reasonable approach because he has everything to lose from his perspective,” Abiteboul told Motorsport.
“But on Ott’s side it is quite the opposite; he has nothing to lose and therefore I expect and look forward to seeing him in action without his hands tied to anything, so that will be interesting to see.
“He knows that we need him for the manufacturers' championship, so that is going to be interesting dynamic.
“Of course Ott can fight, but let’s look at the buffer. It is fairly huge, so Thierry will need to have major troubles for Ott to constitute a threat to him.
“This is why Thierry will make sure he goes through without a big issue.”
Heading into the event, Neuville described his championship lead as “comfortable”, but stated he would need to strike the proper balance with his drive to guarantee he secures the title and helps Hyundai capture the constructors’ crown.
“It is a comfortable lead; the worst-case scenario is we need to take six points,” Neuville told Motorsport.com. “In any other scenario, we are pretty fine.
“We need to find the right balance in Japan because there is still the manufacturers' championship to fight for and nevertheless we have that third car with Andreas Mikkelsen who will go for a push. We need to establish a decent balance in between a safe yet good drive.”
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For his part, Tanak feels there is nothing he can do to grab the championship away from his team-mate.
“I don’t know what difference we can make, but we will try our best,” Tanak told Motorsport.com. “But with this scoring system it doesn’t make much difference.
“It is true a retirement can change things, I guess it depends how much Thierry wants it. If he is clever in Japan and performs a good job, then nobody has a chance.
“But we also have a responsibility for the manufacturers' championship. It is still a significant work ahead of us so we can’t really focus simply on the drivers' title, we are responsible for the team too.”
