The Vauxhall Astra is the European Car of The Year

BIG NEWS, TG.com. Europe has crowned its car of the year, and if you haven’t already guessed, the winner is the very worthy and quite good Vauxhall Astra.

Netting a total of 309 points, it beat the Volvo XC90 (294) and Mazda MX-5 (202) into second and third places. Both are cars we like very much and, maybe, would like to have been top of the leaderboard instead.

But no matter, because the new Astra is really very good. Honest. Our man Paul Horrell, who happens to be a European Car of The Year juror, said of the Astra: “The steering is nicely progressive, so the Astra is a flattering car to drive. It resists understeer and body roll surprisingly well for a hatchback.”

The other cars on the shortlist, which was whittled down from a longlist of more than 40, were the Audi A4, BMW 7-Series, Skoda Superb and Jaguar XE.

Click on the blue words to read our reviews and then tell us, Internet, would you have rather a different car won? Doesn't need to have been on the shortlist, either...