It's not so much a safety or need for it it's more so to compete with the rest of the hot hatches. All brands bar Renault and Opel now offer an AWD turbo 4 or 5 or in BMW's case a 6. So really to just be competitive they need to look at a range topping AWD variant.
Unfortunately yes your more than likely right. Your everyday driver would just slap whatever is cheapest on and the cars do handle the power through the front without too much hassle. But with likely increases in power and the competition offering an AWD system that leave you behind at the line it's hard to imagine them not looking into it.

All that said. There hasn't been any talk that I have heard of since early days about an OPC.

Was originally talk about a GSi fwd turbo and a hi Po OPC/VXR model. But I haven't seen any new information

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