At last! Nissan confirms it’s working on a new 370Z

The sports car isn’t dead. Not yet. Not if Nissan – yes, Nissan – can help it.

After centuries on sale, during which it’s been owned by the likes of King Henry VIII, Joan of Arc and Adam ‘n’ Eve in the garden of Eden, the 370Z is set to make way for an all-new Nissan Z-car. There’s life in the sporting coupe yet, folks.

Naturally, details on the new model are as scarce as cheap bottles of hand-sanitiser. Nissan’s merely released a video promising a fleet of new models under the ‘Nissan Next’ banner, one of which is clearly a long-bonneted, swoopy-rear’d coupe. Oh, and there’s a big ‘Z’ in the back of shot. We’ll go out on a limb and say that, just maybe, this is a successor to the 370Z, which came after the 350Z, continuing a lineage that goes right back to the half-century-old 240Z. Happy days beckon.

Top Gear's retro review: the Nissan 240Z

Will it have another naturally aspirated V6? Unlikely, because of emissions laws. Manual-gearbox sports cars are an endangered species. Could it go turbo? That’d be great news for tuners… What about hybrid or even electric drive, using know-how from the Leaf EV? So many questions. Much to ponder. What sort of Zed would you like? Mini-GT, Japanese muscle car, or nippy sportster?

Oh, one more thing. Among all this ‘Nissan Next’ fever, there’s lots of crossover and SUV-shaped boxes, but a curious and worrying absence of an angular coupe with four ringed taillights. Whisper it, but does this mean there’s no new GT-R in Nissan’s crystal ball? In that case, a new Zed would have to be one heck of a machine. No pressure, then...