What broke at COTY

But it does - when it occurs on a Car of The Year program, it's even less likely to win customers and influence more.

Strangely enough, none of the cars that made the final five had anything fall off, fail or ... go wrong.

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First, the Territory suddenly looked like it had been parked in some dimly lit carpark and been the target of siphoners - the fuel filler cover was absent without leave. Although it went back on easily, I'm told, it probably shouldn't have come off as easily in the first place.

I had a flashback to my youth with the second incident - I grew up with Range Rovers and bits and pieces were always falling off them - trim, window winders (yes, I'm going back a-ways) and electrical gremlins were regular bugbears, along with dust-sealing that can only just be described as making a seal. But when the interior light fitting popped from the ceiling of the Range Rover Evoque, it was a case of - perhaps not quite to the same extent - "the more things change ... "

Not that it broke, per se, but the Focus' fuel filler cover, part of the "clever capless re-fuelling system," seemed to have similar dust sealing properties to the ye olde Range Rovers, leaving dust on the fuel flap.

The piece de resistance was the journey back to the airport from Geelong, perhaps the most speed-camera-infested stretch of bitumen in Victoria, in the fastest car (not by choice, I swear) of the 2011 field.

Volkswagen's Scirocco - all 188kW and 320Nm of it - decided to take away the one thing (apart from Bluetooth phone connection) that I needed for that drive. Cruise control. A little exclamation mark popped up on the dash next to the cruise control symbol and it didn't budge.

So if there's any mail from the Victorian Police, I might see if that's a valid defence.