Ah Ha: MiTo GTA Not Dead After All?

On Tuesday, it was reported that the Alfa Romeo MiTo GTA was on "hold", possibly cancelled for good due to problems in working out the business case for a performance model.

An unnamed Alfa Romeo spokeswoman was quoted saying: “The MiTo GTA has been put on hold. It’s hard to justify building such as high performance car at this present time as the financial crisis means that its not economically viable. And, sadly, it may never be.”

The MiTo GTA originally made an appearance as a concept at the Geneva Auto Show, supposedly offering a preview of the near-identical production version to follow.

Could it have been just that Alfa Romeo was trying to build buzz with that comment? Who knows. But I did say that I thought there was more to the story, and that we would eventually get a GTA regardless. To that end,  here comes the followup today from Autocar, reporting a quote from another Alfa Romeo spokesman (seemingly unnamed once again): “There are question marks about the project but there is an unashamed keenness to get the green light.”

Sounds like they really want to d0 this - and why wouldn't they? It would get adoration from magazines, as well as something to trump the Mini Cooper (MiTo's chief rival) with.  The GTA would have been at the top of the hot hatch class, with it's 4-cylinder making 240 horsepower and besting the Mini Cooper JCW. We'll see when the GTA makes an appearance, but it's good to know it's probably coming.