Loeb wins in Argentina

The victory - Loeb's third in as many years on the Cordoba-based event – was his fourth of 2007 and the 32nd of the Frenchman’s illustrious career.

It also helped the Citroen driver to extend his slender world championship lead over Gronholm to three points.

Gronholm's Finnish countryman and team-mate Mikko Hirvonen made it two Fords on the podium with another Finn Jari-Matti Latvala equalling the best result of his career in fourth for Stobart Ford.

His Norwegian team-mate Henning Solberg hung on to fifth as Dani Sordo – who began the final stage only 5.3 seconds behind him – crashed his Citroen on the Cordoba Superspecial and was forced to settle for sixth.

Seventh and eighth were Chris Atkinson's Subaru and Manfred Stohl's Kronos Citroen while the top ten was completed by the best of the Group N runners with local Mitsubishi driver Federico Villagra heading off Toshihiro Arai' Subaru.

Britain's Matthew Wilson finished 31st in his Stobart Ford.