THE MIDDLE GROUND

Rear wheel drive, mid-engined, punchy performance and exotic looks, particularly for the era – we must be referring to some ‘real’ exotica, surely? But no, we are referring to a pair of ’90s mid-engined sports cars that represent affordable ownership propositions with reasonable running costs that endeavour to entertain yet remain both usable and practical but also offer some interesting investment opportunity too.

The pair we’ve opted to pitch against each other here are the W20 generation of Toyota MR2 and the 986 series of Porsche Boxster.

We’ll start with the arguably prettier of the two, the W20 MR2, produced between 1989-1999 with five revisions throughout its ten-year lifespan offering a range of powerplants, spec and performance as well as both fixed head and Targa top body styles. Dubbed ‘the baby Ferrari’ or, unfortunately also ‘the poor