Haha you got a bebop, you should have nicked the blue carpet out of it and sold it to someone for £50.
Well Ive been in plenty of 172s and driven plenty of valvers and Willys. The Willy is the ultimate hot hatch because it comes from the era of the classic hot hatch and was the best of the bunch then. And up to now theres nothing really thats bettered it in terms of the overall package as a drivers car. It has the looks, the handling, the speed, the exclusivity and the genuine racing pedigree. You might say so does the 205 GTi, but that IMHO is not a good looking car, it has aged badly. And there are loads of them about as well.
The Clio 172 is a great looking tidy car and a lot quicker than most Willys, but again there are loads of them about and personally I dont think the newer Clios have that edge to their styling that the 16v and Williams had. Im not the first person to think that Renault should have made much more of a deal out of the exterior design of the 172 so it was more of an obvious hot hatch. All the rides Ive had in them confirm to me that the 172 is very quick indeed straight out of the box, it punches above its weight, its got all the toys, handles superbly. In pretty much any race the 172 would win against a standard Willy. Just that IMHO it has something missing which I cant put my finger on - the Williams has that missing factor, you can see it just by looking at it. Maybe its cos you have to drive it harder to get the best out of it? I dont know.