Yes, you can still buy classic sports cars for £200

ANYONE who remembers what happened when I spent £100 on a set of wheels might want to look away now, because I've just doubled the stakes.

Regular readers might recall the Renault 5 I managed to blag for the price of a train ticket earlier this year, and I got lucky because - aside from a broken heater which makes West Lancashire permenantly feel like the West Indies - the ancient hatchback's become one of the most reliable things I've ever owned.

But even I couldn't believe myself when I spent twice what it cost on an old sports car that's spent the last ten years of its life stuck inside a garage in Cumbria. Yep, I've just bought an MGB that doesn't work.

Like the original Mini that's always at the top of this column, it's from an era when strikes at British Leyland dotted the TV news bulletins every day and as a result anything that came out of MG's Abingdon factory around that time is going to be crushingly unreliable.

In normal circumstances I wouldn't even bother with the MGB because I've never particularly liked it, but this one's different.

Eagle-eyed readers are going to spot that it's the far more stylish MGB GT, and swaps the soft top for a swoopy bit of steel roofline, the gorgeous Rostyle steel wheels and something called a Webasto sunroof, which is basically a clever bit of folding canvas which looks like it cost about 30p as an optional extra. Other features unique to this particular version are doors way overdue a replacement, decade-old engine oil and brakes which are seized solid. Not quite the £200 bargain buy I was expecting, then?

Of course it is - it's a classic sports car for the price of a long weekend on the continent, and it's got a solid shell and stashes of paperwork thrown in. As a commuter car it's failed already because it's broken, but as something I can imagine swanning around Southport in next year it's packed with potential.

The MGB roadster, the open-top one you always see at classic car shows, has been hogged by CAMRA members desperate to drive them to quaint village pubs you only ever see on Heartbeat, but the B GT is better because its somehow more subtle in its style.

It's The Shadows rather than Cliff Richard.