The interview I read says that Michelin were supposedly better on the first day in wet and worse on second day in dry. So he also claims that he was able to close up on second day due to his tires beeing better then. First day he had a puncture on first stage and no extra spare, that's just what happened.

A bit over a year ago Loeb got in the Puma, never changed a single setting and won Monte vs fulltime drivers that were developing their cars for a year, in a rather similar situation. Since then he led every rally he started on the top level and was always the fastest Puma (beating Breen, who just got 2nd place in a Hyundai).

Losing to Loeb by a small margin surely isn't "a nail in the coffin" for anyone.

Loeb and Ogier results in Rally1 era make everyone currently driving there look like second class drivers though.