No restart for Meeke in Sardinia

Kris Meeke will not restart on the final day of Rally d’Italia Sardegna.

The Briton retired from Saturday’s second stage when his car developed a water leak but had been expected to return to action on Sunday’s remaining four tests.

However, the MINI WRC Team took the decision earlier this morning to withdraw his entry.

“Kris has an issue on the car we’re not 100 per cent sure about it,” said technical director Dave Wilcock. “It’s related to the first day and we need to get to the bottom of it. Kris is obviously disappointed because he was looking forward to the stages but he understands the reasons why.”

“We’re not starting today,” said the 31-year-old Meeke. “It’s disappointing but we don’t want to risk what happened on Friday happening again. There’s a bigger picture.”

Meeke was hampered on day one by a sticking throttle problem, which forced his retirement from the event.

His team-mate, Dani Sordo, starts day three in sixth position in the second MINI John Cooper Works WRC.