It was inevitable that Rover wouldn't survive in the long term, but it was still a tragedy that the company went bust just months before its centenary, in 2005. Its best car was the Rover 75, offered in saloon and estate (Tourer) forms, but by the time everything went badly wrong, even the 75 was getting long in the tooth.
Selling alongside was the Rover 45, a car that was a decade old in 2005, while the smaller Rover 25 was a small family hatch that looked good but couldn't claim to be competitive by the time the axe finally fell on the company.
