I must admit that I’ve struggled to ‘get’ VW’s reborn Scirocco. It looks a little ungainly in photos, like a Golf that’s been squished during transit, and its mechanical make-up is, well, not different enough from VW’s bread-and-butter-mobile, on paper at least.
But a couple of hours in commute (and a bit of a B-road thrash) have been enough to convince me.
I tried the 2.0-litre turbocharged model with the DGS dual-clutc
h gearbox, and while I’d ditch the transmission in favour of a regular six-speed stick, the rest of the package made more sense than I’d expected.
The steering has the same finely grained quality that made it such a hit in the Mk5 Golf GTI, the trick adaptive dampers do actually offer two different types of car (for once), and the two-litre lump has plenty of torque and revs cleanly. True, the cabin isn’t quite different enough from a Golf’s for me, but it’s still a very pleasant place to spend time.
All in all, it seems like an attractive buy, offering enough fun and (just about enough) visual appeal to differentiate it from the Golf. And it should prove a rock-solid ownership proposition; I can see why VW will shift thousands.