I had been saving up for a Vauxhall Tigra for a while, and I hadn't bothered to test drive one until I got near my savings budget. Once I got behind the wheel and drove the thing I could not believe what a disappointment it was! I was so surprised that I drove three examples to make sure the first was representative.

I (like many others) had fallen for the showroom appeal of these cars. They are unbelievably pretty, have lots of gadgets (especially the 1.6 litre cars) and look as if they would be really fun to drive.

In reality, although it is more fun to drive than the old style Corsas-that isn't saying a lot. I suspect a lot of Corsa owners "traded up" and so they did not realise how far off the pace the Tigra is.

So what's wrong with the way it drives? Almost everything - The way it handles, the soggy brakes, the steering that has no feel. The engines will rev and give good motorway cruising speeds, but everything the Tigra gives to the driver it gives grudgingly. It's not just that the Ford Puma and other coupes are better to drive. Most modern non-sporting Fiestas, Kas, Peugeots are far better.

I did a fair bit of research into the reliability of Tigra so I would know what to look for. The news is not good, engines had to be redesigned in 98 to resolve a problem with the sticky EGR Valve. What this meant to the driver was mis-firing and very poor performance on affected models.

Build quality seems to be a bigger issue with the Tigra than with the Corsa. The problem seems to vary - some owners never had a problem and others had problems you wouldn't believe. I would recommend only buying one of these from a Vauxhall main dealer and covered by a Network Q warranty.

The Tigra was a car for the nineties - all spin, no substance.