Re: Re:
offbyone said:
I thought last year was supposed to be the year they did the young inexperienced group and this year they were going to learn from it. Unfortunately they seem to be repeating.
They can't "learn" from it. They go for it for financial reasons. And after Cannondale merge, they've got another bunch of very young riders whose contracts they needed to honour. For riders like Mohoric or Bettiol it's still to early to delier on a WT level, but they couldn't really chose not to hire them.
offbyone said:
Again I thought last year Talansky was aiming for top ten and this year they hoped to do that or better.
I think it was the other way around. Last year Talansky was on a high after winning Dauphine being really close to Contador and Froome in mountains. This year he is having much more troubled season and his form is kinda uncertain. Also the competition looks much stronger this year. Last year there was no Quintana, no Uran, Nibali looked so poorly earlier in the season that not many believed he would be in contention for the win. Pinot and Peraud were not really considered podium-capable riders, yet. Rodriguez was coming back from injury so he was not a threat for GC. Kreuziger was suspended. And TJVG seemed half a level below compared to this year. This year we have all of the main players from last year + some more.
I think it was last year where the hopes for overall podium were more realistic (and I think he could've done it if he avoided those crashes, he looked very strong on stages 2 and 5), and this year the team was talking more about top10.
offbyone said:
They are going to need to be very active during transfer season if they want to be a bigger player next year.
Again, don't count for too much on transfer market from them, they don't really seem to have the money to compete for any big names. The best they can hope for is to keep Dan Martin, whose contract is running out at the end of the year. If they lose him, I doubt they'll be able to lure anyone near as good for his place.
I think their main problem are not riders they have but that something is not working with training this year. With Talansky, Martin, Hesjedal, Slagter, Formolo, Moser, Navardauskas, Haas and Langeveld they have enough talent to perform as a mid-table WT team, which they don't for some reason this year. Also riders like Dombrowski, Van Baarle and Villella should come good soon if they're trained well within the team. And riders like Cardoso and Koren can be very good domestiques (I'm kinda impressed by Koren in this year's TdF, he is probably the only rouleur in the team not performing below expectations).
If they keep all of their best talents and sort out the training, they sould be OK with riders they have. There are maybe 3 or 4 guys in the team that should be replaced, and one of them is Ted King who is retiring at the end of the year. The rest have enough talent for WT IMO, they just need to unlock their potential (and some time to develop for riders like Mohoric or Bettiol).
Maybe they need a proper sprinter. I've read in other thread that Wouter Wippert is joining them for 2016. Not a rider who I expect to set the world on fire, but at least a rider who they can ride for in some of the flat races. Let him take 2 or 3 wins in lesser races + a stage win on a WT race like Tour Down Under and it's a step forward for the team compared to 2015.