Volkswagen Philippines President Felipe Estrella says that he and his team checks feedback from avenues such as social media and motoring websites, including ours, and one of the loudest calls they’ve heard so far is about bringing in the Golf R.

At first, we thought that the VW Philippines team meant the Golf GTI—a model that they previously offered—until they repeatedly mentioned Golf R during the media round table.

Estrella says they’re working to try to bring it in, although nothing is set in stone yet.

If ever Volkswagen Philippines does manage to bring it in, the all-new Golf R is quite a performance machine decimating hot hatches from Audi, BMW, and Mercedes-AMG.

At its heart is a 2.0-liter TSI engine pumping out 315 horsepower and 420 Nm of torque. This is mated to either a 6-speed manual or a 7-speed dual clutch transmission.

More than raw power, the Golf R has a new 4Motion all-wheel drive system that adds rear-axle torque vectoring.

While the standard 4Motion all-wheel-drive systems can send up to 50 percent of the engine’s total power to the rear axle. The new torque vectoring system uses a rear differential that can now distribute up to 100 percent of the rear torque to an individual rear wheel. This gives the Golf R the ability to engaging a “Drift” mode.

It must be noted that if Volkswagen Philippines does bring in the Golf R, this isn’t the first time they’ve dabbled in the R badge. In 2017, after bringing in the Golf GTI, they also brought in a handful of Golf R units as a sort-of test market.

Eventually, after the batch was sold out, they instead offered the aftermarket route by offering the ABT Power-Up module in the milder Golf GTI.

However, with the prevalence of relatively affordable high-performance vehicles such as the Subaru WRX STI, Honda Civic Type R, and the upcoming Toyota GR Yaris, maybe it’s about time Volkswagen enters this segment once more. Who knows, maybe the second time’s the charm?