He made it through the stage, dropping more than seven minutes in the process.

Event scrutineers have observed damage to the Citroen C3 WRC’s roll cage, and will not allow the car to return to the stages for the weekend.

Only Andreas Mikkelsen remains in the running on Friday afternoon of Citroen’s trio of drivers, after Craig Breen was sidelined by a damaged gearbox casing on SS3.

Citroen’s deputy team principal Marek Nawarecki told Motorsport.com: “It was a disappointing morning. We have two cars which are not in the race anymore.

“The positive thing from the first stages was the pace of Kris – this was good and he was leading provisionally. But after this mistake, we have no possibility for him to continue.

“It’s disappointing. It was important for Kris to finish the rally and to bring some manufacturer points – this was the target of this rally.”

The Northern Irishman’s accident is precisely not what he wanted following mistakes on the preceding rounds in Argentina and Portugal.