Rated: the Toyota Yaris, Land Rover Defender and Volkswagen ID.3 are among the contenders The annual Car of the Year award – the one all manufacturers want to win more than anything else – reaches its climax this afternoon with the announcement of the winner from Geneva. After a miserable year, during which the 2020 Geneva motor show was one of the earliest major events to be cancelled as Covid-19 spread, these seven cars represent the apogee of automotive endeavour. But which is the best? Most motoring journalists will admit that there aren’t many questions about cars to which the answer isn’t “Golf”. Through eight generations since 1974, Volkswagen’s flagship family hatchback has delivered class-leading transport to the masses, been Europe’s bestselling car by a country mile and won the Car of the Year award twice, in 1992 and 2013. Yet all this might be about to change.