Cavendish 'Abused' by HTC

[Machu Picchu]

Article on BBC that Cavendish feels 'kind of abused' that he hasn't been offered a new contract.

"I know the people around me appreciate that it's like that [but] I'm not sure any more if my team does, not my team as a whole but the manager.

"I haven't been offered another contract yet so I don't know why that is.

"At the end of the day I'm never going to stop racing. I love racing and I'm going to race for my team-mates.

"But [with] the pressures, the normal person's life that I've lost, you should see the benefits coming with that and I don't get that. I'm disappointed with that."

Story here

So, is he angling for a way out of HTC or just a new contract ?_?

 

[saganftw]

maybe they waited for WC,if cav was world champion he would ve asked for bigger contract i guess

 

[delbified]

he's obviously now worth more than what he signed on for at HTC and wants to renegotiate.

 

[auscyclefan94]

World Champ or not, Cav deserves a raise from his original contract especially of all the stage wins at the tour he has brought the team. I dislike the guy but he is a big factor of making the team what they are today.

 

[Tuarts]

He's going to leave and be the white horse (pun intended) to lead Pegasus!

 

[liamclarke4]

i dont think leaving htc would be suck a good thing for cav. i think if he was to leave sky would break the bank to get him

 

[joy118118]

Obviously Bob doesnt care Cav's leaving. Cav is too expensive. HTC has heaps of talents. It is easy for them to bring up a new 'Cavendish'.

 

[Curls_21]

he's not unhappy really, just angling for the best new contract he can get; by going public with this will have all the big teams checking their finances and working out how much they can offer him, but also put pressure on HTC to sort out his new contract.

Basically he loves cycling but he ain't going to race for a "pittance" anymore

Interestingly though alot of HTC's 2010 contracts have only been extended by a year

 

[Vonn Brinkman]

Obviously Bob doesnt care Cav's leaving. Cav is too expensive. HTC has heaps of talents. It is easy for them to bring up a new 'Cavendish'.

He should care though.
I don't think it is that easy getting another talent that will win a team 23 GT (including 15 Tour de France ) stages in just 3 years. I would do my best to keep him. And it is not as if Bob doesn't have the money....

 

[joy118118]

He should care though.
I don't think it is that easy getting another talent that will win a team 23 GT (including 15 Tour de France ) stages in just 3 years. I would do my best to keep him. And it is not as if Bob doesn't have the money....

Bob has enough money. I heard some rumors that Columbia and Scott leave because Bob asked them for more money. If Cavendish said that he didnt even get a contract was true, surely Bob and Aldag have realized that the team can still be very competitive without Cav. And because of Cavendish they lost talents like EBH. Maybe they want a change now.

 

[Curls_21]

Bob has enough money. I heard some rumors that Columbia and Scott leave because Bob asked them for more money. If Cavendish said that he didnt even get a contract was true, surely Bob and Aldag have realized that the team can still be very competitive without Cav. And because of Cavendish they lost talents like EBH. Maybe they want a change now.

He still has a year left on his contract, and is just angling for more money now instead of waiting for another year; HTC being a business as such obviously want to keep to the current contract as it is cheaper for them.

Its all business thats all.

 

[Jamsque]

I think it is just business, yes. He's putting pressure on HTC to offer him a more lucrative deal. If he was really unhappy about his pay situation or the way the team was treating him I'm sure he'd be trying to get sold to another team.

 

[scribe]

He still has a year left on his contract, and is just angling for more money now instead of waiting for another year; HTC being a business as such obviously want to keep to the current contract as it is cheaper for them.

Its all business thats all.

A year left on his current contract and he is crying to the media about that? Who held a gun to his head and made him sign this in the first place?

This guy is damaged goods.

 

[Fowsto Cope-E]

Maybe he should join Garmin-Cervelo & make a sprinting superteam

 

[happychappy]

I'd love it if he joined Sky, just simply because it'd annoy Bradley Big Head Wiggins.

 

[ultimobici]

After the lean start he had last season it is only natural to want to negotiate now when he has a successful Tour to use as a lever, rather than risk negotiating this time next year when he may not be as successful.

Anything he has done in previous seasons becomes increasingly irrelevant as time ticks on. Imagin if he only wins 2 stages in 2011. His position is weakened relative to now when he has 5 in the bank.

 

[luckyboy]

Interestingly though alot of HTC's 2010 contracts have only been extended by a year

Columbia are stopping their sponsorship next year aren't they? Maybe they're just being careful.

 

[papafrog]

This guy is the biggest cry baby in the peloton. From other sprinters "conspiring" against him to the media hounding him to this or that. Now he's calling out his team manager in public regarding his contract. It's extremely immature and unprofessional. If he wants a new contract then keep it in house. If you can't work out renegotiation or an extension then leave when your contract is up but HTC-Columbia has been very good to this cry baby. It's a two way street. Shut up and just ride, Cav.

 

[D Avoid]

I'd love it if he joined Sky, just simply because it'd annoy Bradley Big Head Wiggins.

Waz Bradley Wig Head Biggins got to do with this love great relationship? maybe a bigger Iggo.

 

[Zinoviev Letter]

Cavendish is the fastest man on a bicycle. Nobody else is even close.

That means that he's worth a lot of money to a team. HTC have been very successful over the last few years, and the great bulk of that success has been based around combining the fastest sprinter in the world with a dedicated sprinter's team.

Now obviously HTC signed Cavendish before he became the dominant sprinter in the world, and that means that they probably aren't paying him anything close to his current market value. That's always a recipe for tension. Cavendish is putting pressure on his employers to pay him what he's worth, and doing so in a way that alerts other potential employers that he might be becoming available. That's a perfectly sensible thing to do, and indicates that Cavendish is probably pretty well advised.

The idea that HTC can just replace Cavendish is laughable. Even more laughable than the idea that Saxo Bank can just conjure up a replacement Contador, in fact.

On the other hand, HTC certainly can promote a very good sprinter or two and then put them in with the best dedicated sprinting team and still win a lot of races. Not as many as with Cavendish, but more than most teams can dream of. If they think that paying Cavendish his market value isn't a good deal for the number of extra wins he brings as compared to using their train with a merely very good sprinter then they might conceivably be planning to do without him after his contract ends. But here's the thing, if they were planning that why would they let Greipel go? They pretty clearly considered him to be their number 2 sprinter.

 

[the vagabond]

As good as Cav is, he's not as dominant as two years ago. Quite likely that in two more years he will be less dominant than today. Having your best year at an early age is not the optimum situation for maximizing career earnings - that's life.

 

[Jamsque]

I disagree, vagabond. He had a slow start to this season because he had a bad off-season, and he was ill at the start of the Vuelta so he wasn't great there, but at the Tour de France he was the same world-beating Cavendish he's always been. Honestly I'd expect him to be stronger next year, he'll certainly want to have another tilt at M-SR and the worlds course will probably suit him well.

 

[Arnout]

I don't see one of the current sprinters beating him on a regular basis in the Tour. The only one who can do that when Cav is in top form is Petacchi, but he is quite old.

I think the continuation of the Cav dominance depends on new talent. I don't see that coming this or next year. So yes, he deserves more money than he will probably get from a contract 3 years ago.

 

[LugHugger]

As good as Cav is, he's not as dominant as two years ago. Quite likely that in two more years he will be less dominant than today. Having your best year at an early age is not the optimum situation for maximizing career earnings - that's life.

tell that to tom boonen

I still expect the Cavendish and Farrar to win 90-95% of the meaningful sprints between them for the foreseeable future or until a new sprinter emerges.

 

[Dalakhani]

Surely part of the problem is that Cavendish is worth less to HTC than to other teams, but HTC are worth more to Cavendish than other teams.

What I mean is that HTC have Greipel as an alternative and Greipel + HTC train = lots of stage wins.

And, on the flipside, Cavendish - HTC train = fewer stage wins for Cav. (And far less chance of getting that Tour Green Jersey.)

So, logically, HTC should offer him less than he'd get from some of the other big teams... and Cavendish should take it.

(Unless he's just a money-grubbing hoor.)

Steve