Ultimately Latvala’s couldn’t take advantage as he stalled the engine on stage, dropping to 15.2s behind Tanak ahead of tonight’s superspecial stage.
Suninen was set to overhaul Latvala after taking third from Meeke with a second-fastest time in Lousa and then fastest in Gois. However his Fiesta “lost all brakes” on stage six, plummeting him down to sixth and elevating Meeke back into third.
Meeke spotted a puncture warning light on stage five, but ultimately admitted he couldn’t “match the pace of the others when it’s rough, so there’s still some work to do.”World champion Sebastien Ogier sought to recover some of the damage done in the morningwhen he was forced to sweep the loose gravel from the surface of the stages.
His pace was more encouraging relative to Tanak, losing just 2.9s across the loop, but he was overhauled by Thierry Neuville on stage four who was on his own recovery mission following a stall in the morning.
Ogier responded on the following test to retake what would become fourth from Neuville, but it was the Hyundai that ended the loop ahead, just 0.7s in front and crucially behind in tomorrow’s start order.
Yet Neuville was left a little frustrated, describing the handling of his i20 as “not perfect.”
M-Sport’s Elfyn Evans had been running ahead of the pair but drama was to befall him on stage five, as he pulled up with a suspected throttle pedal issue.
After finding a loose connection and reconnecting it, he managed to restart but would drop four minutes by the end of the stage. The issue was sorted and he completed the afternoon loop but outside the top 10.
Ogier’s Citroen teammate Esapekka Lappi was slowed by the hanging dust left behind Evans’ Fiesta, thus losing 56 seconds – but the Finn is expected to get that time back. Otherwise he completed a clean loop of stages to hold eighth.
Gus Greensmith lies a place ahead of Lappi on his WRC debut for M-Sport. The Englishman holds seventh place, but was frustrated to have lost time at the beginning of stage five when his car wouldn’t engage into stage mode.
Hyundai pair Sebastien Loeb and Dani Sordo remain well outside the top 10, beginning the afternoon 15 and 18 minutes off the lead respectively after both suffered a fuel related issue in the morning.
Sordo topped stage four but suffered another setback in the form of a front-left puncture on stage five.
Leading WRC2 drivers Ole Christian Veiby and Jan Kopecky round out the top 10.
Source: Motorsport.com
Top Ten after SS 6
| POS | CAR NO | DRIVER | CO-DRIVER | TEAM | ELIGIBILITY | TIME |
| 1. | 8 |  O. TÄNAK |
M. JÄRVEOJA |
 TOYOTA GAZOO RACING WRT |
M | 1:00:50.1 |
| 2. | 10 |  J. LATVALA |
M. ANTTILA |
TOYOTA GAZOO RACING WRT |
M | 1:01:05.3 |
| 3. | 5 |  K. MEEKE |
S. MARSHALL |
TOYOTA GAZOO RACING WRT |
M | 1:01:11.8 |
| 4. | 11 |  T. NEUVILLE |
N. GILSOUL |
 HYUNDAI SHELL MOBIS WORLD RALLY TEAM |
M | 1:01:15.4 |
| 5. | 1 |  S. OGIER |
J. INGRASSIA |
 CITROEN TOTAL WRT |
M | 1:01:16.1 |
| 6. | 3 | T. SUNINEN |
M. SALMINEN |
 M-SPORT FORD WORLD RALLY TEAM |
M | 1:02:00.6 |
| 7. | 44 | G. GREENSMITH |
E. EDMONDSON |
M-SPORT FORD WORLD RALLY TEAM |
M | 1:02:09.6 |
| 8. | 4 | E. LAPPI |
J. FERM |
CITROEN TOTAL WRT |
M | 1:03:03.2 |
| 9. | 43 |  O. VEIBY |
 J. ANDERSSON |
 OLE CHRISTIAN VEIBY |
WRC2 | 1:04:28.7 |
| 10. | 24 |  J. KOPECKY |
P. DRESLER |
 SKODA MOTORSPORT |
WRC2PRO | 1:04:32.9 |