Renault Laguna Sport Tourer

The Laguna is an increasingly good car with a sorted chassis and impressively high-quality feel. Estate looks better than the hatch and is genuinely cavernous

• Comfort

  The Laguna keeps the grand French tradition of softness going, but without feeling boggy. The cabin is also very refined at speed, making the whole package feel infinitely more executive than it really is.

  

• Performance

  Stick with Renault's superb dCi diesels and you can't go far wrong. In three stages of tune, 130, 150 and 175bhp, all offer the right balance between poke and economy.

  

• Cool

  Not sure about this. At the moment the Laguna’s front end just looks too weird to us to be cool, but there's something commendable about not defaulting to a Vectra or Mondeo in the UK.

  

• Quality

  Nicely designed and executed inside, the new Laguna looks clean and fresh and the materials used feel expensive. You shouldn't have any problems from the engines either.

  

• Handling

  The Laguna is a slightly mixed bag when it comes to driver enjoyment. A grippy and responsive chassis is let down by ultra-light steering that's sufficiently devoid of feel to make faster corners pretty unnerving. Clever four-wheel steering on the top-spec GT adds grip and feel.

  

• Practicality

  The hatch on the standard Laguna isn’t exactly small, but the Sport Tourer is properly gigantic on the inside. Don’t go thinking you’ll squeeze into many city parking spaces, though.

  

• Running costs

  In this market, where fleet buyers dominate and cars do high mileage, the Laguna doesn't do terribly well on resale. But as a private buy insurance costs are low and the diesel engines very economical.