Elfyn Evans thanked his team after ending second in this season's World Rally Championship.

A second place at Rally Monza in Italy saw the Dolgellau star end runner-up to Toyota team-mate Sebastien Ogier who ended 7.3 seconds clear to win his eighth WRC title.

Evans remained upbeat despite ending second, saying: "It's been a pretty okay year but I can't help but feel a bit disappointed right now.

"You always look to the places you could have done better, but I have to say a really special thank you to this team."

The 32-year-old won two of the 12 events on this year's calendar, in Portugal and Finland while Ogier won the Rallye Monte-Carlo, Rally Croatia, Rally Italia Sardegna and Safari Rally Kenya before claiming his fifth victory of the season this weekend.

It is the second year in a row that Ogier has clinched the title ahead of his fellow Yaris driver with a final round victory at Monza.

Both drivers survived scares on the final day after swapping the lead between them multiple times over the opening two days, which featured closed-road stages in the mountains as well as circuit-based runs around Monza.

Despite clipping a concrete barrier on Sunday's opening stage 14, Ogier matched his title rival's time to maintain his overnight 0.5 second lead.

On the following run, Evans and co-driver Scott Martin stalled twice to see the gap grow to 7.6 seconds.

"I locked up the brakes and couldn't get the car turned and went into the bales and stalled," said Evans after the stage. "We had another stall later on too. Not a great stage."

Evans was fourth and Ogier fifth on the final power stage as Hyundai driver Thierry Neuville completed a final-day clean sweep to secure fourth place on the rally behind Spain's Dani Sordo.

Belgian Neuville finished third in the Championship with 176 points, 31 behind Evans total of 207.

Ogier amassed 230 points and is one title win short of Sebastien Loeb's all-time record nine championship while Evans' and Ogier's team, Toyota Gazoo Racing, won the 2021 constructors' championship title by 59 points from Hyundai Shell Mobis World Rally Team.