Can these two new entrants from Korea override the traditional Japanese sedan decision?
SHOOTOUT: Chevrolet Cruze 1.8 LS
Kia Cerato 2.0
Toyota Corolla 1.6 Professional
Asking a bunch of adrenalin-infused motoring hacks such as ourselves to drive the latest breed of Corolla-segment sedans should be a lot like trying to invite Eminem to a Mother’s Day party.
Yet this is the bread-and-butter of South African motoring and there have been some interesting developments here of late.
“Take a deep breath and look at today’s post-Great-Recession price lists”
At the beginning of last year, one could buy almost any sedan in this segment with a 2-litre engine and full house specification for around R200 000. Take a deep breath and look at today’s post-Great-Recession price lists and you’re mainly looking at mid-spec 1600s.
But the two new South Korean entrants you see here promise to stretch that budget a lot further. Chevrolet's new Cruze might seem like an American at face value, but it's actually a global car designed by a global design team situated at GM-Daewoo in South Korea.
Kia's new Cerato, on the other hand, is a bonafide Korean and testament to the great strides that this car-building country has been making of late. But can it, and the new Chev, beat the market leader from Japan?
So with R200 000 worth of monopoly money in our back pockets, we decided to see how far our previously-extravagant budget could take us in the C-segment by pitting the country’s former best seller against these two lesser-proven newcomers..
