Ladies and others, please may I present the very best polished turd possible - the Mk5 1991 European Ford Escort.
Never before has a new car managed to disappoint so many people at once as this one did. At the end of the 1980s Ford had the best selling car - the old Escort (which as I have been told here was NOT the same as the US one but it looked the same).
But by then the old car faced tougher competition. Peugeot had the 306
which was damn good. Rover had the (Honda based) 200 series
which was damn good. Vauxhall / Open (aka GM) had the Astra which was, er, cheap
Ford delayed a replacement for a year and then launched this :
Woohoo!
Er
No.
Meet a very young Mr Jeremy Clarkson on a road test of a car with only 4 cylinders...