SINCE the Suzuki Swift was reborn and remade over a dozen years ago, it’s been one of the supermini segment’s top driver’s choices, but strangely the flagship Sport has lacked the hot-hatch performance and chassis to take on the class establishment led by the Volkswagen Polo GTI.

Now the third-generation version has landed in Australia, just a few short months after its Frankfurt Motor Show debut, threatening to upend the European chain of baby hot-hatch command. Does the Japanese upstart succeed?