MERCEDES-BENZ C300 - A JUNIOR S-CLASS? THAT'D BE NO SMALL FEAT

HAVE YOU ever paused to wonder why there aren't any small luxury cars?

- ANDY ENRIGHT

You know, all of the features and quality of an expensive car only poured into a more conveniently sized package? The reason you tend not to see these cars is the same reason why you don't expect a large car to handle as crisply as a smaller, lighter one: physics.

Put simply, a small car will never travel down the road with the comportment of a large one. It can't. Its wheelbase is shorter, the sprung to unsprung mass ratios are different and so on. So when Mercedes-Benz informed us that the next generation C-Class aimed to deliver the luxury of the S-Class limousine in a smaller package, you can perhaps forgive a little initial cynicism. This never works.

Thing is, Mercedes has become extremely good at figuring out what works with the C-Class. More than 10.5 million have been shifted since 1982 in more than 100 markets arour the globe. The last model, the W205, which was sold between 2014 and now, sold a massive 2.5m units alone. That number will continue to grow, as C205 coupe and A205 convertible versions of the body will live on, for the time being at least.

Here in Australia, the W205's relative successes against its rivals were even starker, selling more than 60,000 in total. Last year marked a shift, however. While Mercedes will still easily able to cover off the Audi A4/A5's sales, the ageing C-Class found itself comfortably eclipsed by the new BMW 3 and 4 Series, Munich outselling Stuttgart by 28 percent in this instance.