New Land Rover Discovery spy shots

Discovery Sport not Land Rover enough for you? Looks like there's a proper one coming too

Of its type the new Discovery Sport is a smart, practical compact SUV and one with just enough Land Rover in it to qualify for the badge. But compared with the 'proper' Discovery 4 perhaps not quite the car it once was. Fear not though because the Sport is just the first member of a new Discovery range to bridge the gap between style statement Evoque and more senior Sport and Range Rover. The subtleties of branding mean the Land Rover badge underlines its intended role as a more functional, practical range, leaving Range Rover products as the 'statement' vehicles.

Discovery silhouette familiar here

Enough marketing talk. Here we have a large, angular 4x4 more in keeping with the Discovery lineage we already know. Heavily disguised or not it's clearly got the Land Rover/Range Rover corporate front end but from there the flat sides, chunky C-pillar and conventional square back are all much more in keeping with Discovery tradition. No stepped roof this time and it's hard to see whether the trademark rear skylights/extended rear windows have been maintained but it's obvious enough this will be a much more practical vehicle than the existing Sport or more style-led Range Rovers.

Without any other vehicles around to offer a sense of scale it's hard to tell quite how big this Discovery is. But going by the placement of the spare wheel and exhausts surrounding it we'll take a punt on it sharing architecture with the aluminium Range Rover Sport - those rear wishbones look to have JLR's signature integral link format too. Its combination of clever packaging and ability to independently tune lateral and longitudinal compliance should mean the engineers can give the car its own character and avoid the sense it's simply a generic platform-based product.

Aluminium should save plenty of weight

Those aluminium Range Rover underpinnings will help address the Discovery 4's reputation for being a bit on the hefty side, its belt and braces combination of unitary construction AND a ladder frame chassis giving it proper Land Rover cred but leaving the scales creaking. Considering they took nearly half a tonne out of the Range Rover Sport in the switch to aluminium you'd have to hope for at least that - maybe more - for the Discovery. Will this harm the car's 'proper 4x4' credentials? Perhaps a tad but the benefits in on-road performance, economy and emissions are impossible to ignore. Engines will likely be diesel-focused, with the inevitable hybridisation at some stage to follow.

We like a Range Rover on PH but there are plenty who find them a little too brash; if that's you but you want a full-size, British built SUV and true successor to the Discovery crown it looks like you won't have long to wait.

Search for a Land Rover Discovery in the PH classifieds here.