Blue Oval’s latest small crossover mainly rights every EcoSport wrong – and should scare the heck out of category rivals. Shame it wasn’t a little cheaper.

Price: $37,990.

Powertrain and economy: 1.0-litre turbo petrol three-cylinder with 92kW/170Nm, 5.3L/100km, 7-speed dual clutch transmission, FWD.

Vital statistics: 4207mm long, 1805mm wide, 1570mm high, 2588mm wheelbase, luggage capacity 468 litres, 17-inch alloy wheels.

We like: Equipment level, effervescent engine, great chassis.

We don't like: Slightly uncomfortable price zone; no 1.5-litre option.

A POOR drivetrain, second-rate finish, outdated infotainment and design awkwardness … for anyone holding conviction that crossovers, especially small ones, are the motoring equivalent of gunge on a shoe, the Ford EcoSport made for an easy target. 

It was terrible, delivering way too little, staying in the market way too long and serving only to make everything in the sector look great by comparison.

Unloved and unlovely, it demanded to be called out and I slept all the better for doing so. The best thing to be said about that car is that, as years of desultory sales suggest, it didn’t sucker too many cash-carrying consumers. 

Anyone who wondered how much embarrassment Ford felt about foisting that car on us for almost six years will find the answer in the replacement.

If ever a vehicle feels as though it’s here to make up for past wrongs, it’s the Puma: It’s the gift that’s required after you’ve made a total mess and need to do something truly extraordinary to put everything to rights.

After a week of driving, the only reason I don’t feel compelled to call the Puma a trump card is, well … America, right?

Like the preceding product whose name deserves no further mention, the Puma is a quasi-sports utility built upon on Fiesta underpinnings. Only this time the genetic modification required to create a crossover has maintained, if not actually enlivened, all the good DNA.

When thinking Puma, it’s only right to also consider how it stands with the Fiesta given both are so closely related. They could be closer – I’ll get back to why in a moment – but it’s fair to suggest that if you know the hatch, you should know what to expect from the Puma: A mixture of good looks, incredibly sharp, engaging handling, and sensible old-school Ford practicality and mechanical simplicity.

Our market only takes the Fiesta in its ST hot hatch format, and has also selected the Puma with a less fiery drivetrain, yet perusal of the pricing sheets shows this hasn’t been enough to cause clear separation between the cars.

Regardless that the entry Puma has been launched with a tasty sub-$30,000 price tag (albeit a temporary inducement, the full RRP being $10 short of $34k), there is challenge with the alternate flagship ST-Line format as tested, in that it costs another $2500 over the $35,490 Fiesta ST. 

That premium would be easier to swallow had they common powerplants. Yet that’s not the case. The Puma delivers with a smaller capacity and lower output version of the three-cylinder petrol specific to this class of car; so, a 1.0-litre with 92kW and 170Nm against a 147kW/290Nm 1.5-litre.

Imagining a Puma with the larger unit? It does exist, as the Puma ST, a sister ship to the Fiesta flier, even more pumped for pep with another 30Nm but also tuned for similar dynamic result. I’d like to see it here. Perhaps you feel the same. Don’t hold hope.  

It’s the gearbox. Puma ST is in the same camp as Fiesta ST; it’s manual or nothing. And while that non-choice is apparently fine for Fiesta ST cognoscenti, Ford NZ reckons it would be cold-shouldered by Puma buyers. Hence why we restrict to the 1.0-litre. It marries to a seven-speed dual clutch auto (a new gearbox with a wet clutch, not related to Ford’s previous and problematic PowerShift).

More relevant to the price premium a Puma ST-Line has over the Fiesta ST is the difference in equipment. As much as the Fiesta ST always seemed well-sorted, Ford has chosen the Puma to be a showcase for its best driver assist tech, so it picks up additional features that aren’t yet available to the hatch.

These include evasive steering assist, a more advanced (as it has pedestrian and cyclist detection) evasive steer assist, automatic park assist, all-round parking sensors (Fiesta is rear only), adaptive cornering lights, a power liftgate, a wireless phone charging pad and Ford Pass connectivity with an embedded modem, which allows remote checking, lock function and engine pre-start from your phone.

Standard across both Pumas are cruise control with adjustable speed limiting, emergency brake assist, a rear-view camera with 180 degree split view, speed limit sign recognition while the ST-Line adds black exterior detailing, paddle shifters on the steering wheel, auto high-beam, upgraded interior trim, full digital instruments, auto climate air, adaptive cruise and automatic parking.

The end result is that even though it hasn’t the punch to match a Fiesta ST, it does rather out do the hatch for panache; in the SUV, there’s a nicely quasi-premium air.

So, there’s that to look at. Then there’s the look itself. A shape that suits some shades more than others was hugely appealing in the test car’s silvered grey metallic, which Ford calls ‘solar’. There’s just something about how this car sits and the smiley front end is a friendly element that’ll do no harm.

It's good inside, too. Yes, there's a lot of familiar carry-over from the Fiesta and the Focus as well, yet as much as that means a fair swag of dark plastic, and not all of it is soft to touch, it does deliver well for ambience and ergonomic quality, with a somewhat youthful aesthetic (check out the USB-C outlet next to the usual USB slot).

An analogue instrument cluster is complemented by a 4.2-inch TFT driver display nestled between the tacho and speedo, providing a host of information including speed sign recognition, fuel consumption and a digital speedo. It all works well enough and is intuitive to use and scroll through. 

Comfort is also good and though the cabin will not pass the Tardis test in respect to space in the rear, that section will be tolerable for children up to and including tall teenagers, as much as anything because there's plenty of head room. The front is plenty roomy. The boot is decent, by both the standards of the class and when compared to the Fiesta. It’s also highly practical, thanks to its clever height-adjustable floor and useful 80-litre MegaBox, a plastic-lined storage tub under the floor. Other storage options are also well considered, including a large central bin with two layers.

And now comes the bit where the engine gets bagged, right? Actually no. It doesn’t. For sure, it’s a wee thing and, yes, the outputs aren’t terribly amazing, but it really works hard to convince that a one-litre is well big enough for the kind of car it sets out to be.

The car was no sooner in my hands than it was put into a six-hour open road drive through which it was shown no particular mercy. No ignoring the lawful limits but certainly running right to those, particularly over the last 90 minutes after my wife phoned to say one of our dogs had decamped to a neghbour’s farm on a rabbit hunting spree and was showing no willingness to return (it all ended well).

It needs to be rowed along, no argument, and you need to ready to manually stir the gear changes because sometimes the box can be a slow to react, but the effort it worth it. These tri-cylinder EcoBoost engines are really special and this one is eminently likeable. The higher it revs, the more effervescent it seems and though it doesn’t have the muscularity of the 1.5-litre – the 0-100kmh time is nowhere near as athletic, nor the cited top speed – it is a very willing, sweet, little engine, with surprisingly strong spurts of acceleration and a gently fruity exhaust note, too.

The overall abiding memory from our time together is that, even when given the stick and lots of redline-heading hand-shifting, it simply sips petrol; Ford’s claim of 5.3 litres per 100km was never touched, but on the big run alone it sat on 6.1, which I thought was pretty fare given the driving condition. The only reason I was almost out of petrol by the end of the run was that it has a small fuel tank, just 42 litres.

It’s not just this engine that makes the Puma a rewarding drive. The steering is just wonderful, communicating all the time and allowing you to feel every nuance of what the car is up to. 

The rest of the chassis keeps up, too. It’s the car the EcoSport never came close to being. The widish wheeltrack lends something a settled feel in cruising, but it’s only secondary roads with loads of twists and turns where Puma really becomes deeply impressive; it really makes the most of the Fiesta’s gifted chassis and its agility and confidence through bends is truly immersive. It’s a more involving and engaging experience than comes from Ford’s other newly-released SUV, the Escape, and surely that’s a result of the different genetic compositions, the latter being rather less Euro-centric.

If there’s perhaps one bugbear, it’ll be the ride quality. Those 215/55 17-inch tyres offer great grip, and from an aesthetic perspective the rims look decent, from the comfort perspective, there’s some cost, with a degree of jiggle and fidget over coarse chip, where tyre roar also becomes evident. Drivers might not mind, but passengers do tend to comment. 

All in all, though, this is a car that deserves consideration. The small-compact crossover category is very much a shoppers’ paradise at the moment, and the Puma has some stern opposition from all the over place. The year began with the surprisingly engaging and strong value Kia Seltos making a play and since the Puma came along Toyota has introduced the Yaris Cross.

 This version would be better if it had price equality with the Fiesta ST; yes, with Puma you get a bit more kit, but it’s not easy to argue why a smaller, less power engine should carry that premium. And while latest European design and build clearly comes at price, let’s not forget it also sources out of one the cheapest places to build cars, Romania.

Nonetheless, the ace cards are that it is strongly outfitted, has an interesting styling and drives and handles far better than it ought to. It’s the complete antithesis of the EcoSport in that regard – and, so, also proof that Ford now at least understands a small crossover needn't be a cynical marketing exercise, and can actually be as entertaining as it is practical, and that neither of those need be a compromise.