Vauxhall Crossland 1.2 Turbo 130 2021 UK review

Still only a mid-pack player in a busy crossover market, but simple and easy to operate. Worth considering if you can haggle a bargain Vauxhall is backing simplicity with the facelifted version of its smallest crossover hatchback, the Crossland. And it has dropped the slightly embarrassing X suffix from the model name, which isn’t a bad place to start. The bigger Grandland still has one; but, to me, it always sat like suspiciously fashionable trainers on someone old enough to know better than to wear them.The car’s new all-black, fully sealed front grille panel is Vauxhall’s latest bit of brand design language, which it calls ‘the vizor’. Given that it only displaces the car’s cooling apertures downwards, I’m not sure it markedly improves the car’s frontal styling, but it might look better on all-electric cars. At least it makes a change, and there are new distinguishing features at the rear as well.The engine range has swollen slightly, while others seem to be contracting. There are now two 1.5-litre diesels in addition to three 1.2-litre petrols, and both upper-end options can be had with two-pedal automatic gearboxes.