Audi A5 Sportback 2.0 TDI 170 SE

For those confused by the A5 Sportback, Audi provides helpful guidance in its advertising: ‘think of it as a coupé with five doors’.

It’s a choice description for a car which sits aside from the usual fleet offering – indeed, its only natural rival comes from the same stable: Volkswagen’s Passat CC.

But a fleet car it is, with more than half of its 816 registrations last year heading into company arms.

Audi was expecting to sell only 550 – the Sportback went on sale in October – which suggests its initial forecast of 4,700 sales this year might also be underestimated.

It’s easy to see why this version of the A5 is popular.

For drivers it offers a spacious boot, foldable rear seats, plenty of room for four adults and practical access with the rear doors – in addition to the usual Audi attributes of style, quality and reliability.

For fleets, the Sportback has competitive running costs (38.5p per mile for three years/60,000 miles), helped by strong residuals (39%) and low fuel consumption.

Our car is regularly nudging 50mpg, only slightly behind the official figure of 54.3mpg.

That’s better than the Passat, at 50.4mpg, although the CC’s £2,000 lower list price helps it to beat the A5 by 2p per mile on running costs.

Frugally driven, I’m anticipating the Sportback to achieve upwards of mid 50s. I’ll keep you posted.