Yes but Ayuso is nobody , he can leave right now and this doesnt change anything. He is not the guy in UAE
For Matxin, he's very important, just look at his interviews.
UAE signed Ayuso as the best U23 rider of his generation, the best by far, and they've invested years in developing him. They'll see him as a failure if he leaves for another team.
UAE has many Spaniards in its structure; the feeling is they want a Spaniard to be the next Contador. Ayuso, Torres, Pericas. Matxin is particularly fixated on Spanish talent.
Furthermore, ever since Jumbo won the three GTs in the same year, Matxin has been obsessed with this. During the preseason, he reiterated that this year's goal was that. They've already failed at the Giro.
To achieve this in the future, he will believe Ayuso is necessary. Almeida is also unreliable; he frequently gets sick or has accidents.
I see clear blackmail. Leaking a journalist friend that you are leaving the team is something that's all too common in professional sports to achieve a goal.
By the way, and to clarify what I said before, I didn't say that this is why the UAE told Pogacar not to go to the Vuelta for Ayuso. But I think that as soon as Pogacar raised his doubts, the UAE did nothing to advise him or convince him to go to the Vuelta, and they saw an opportunity to resolve the Ayuso issue. Perhaps without Ayuso's threat, they would have asked Pogacar to reflect this week because it's very common for many cyclists to be burned out by the third week of the Tour, but then think differently a week later. Without that problem, I think UAE wouldn't have announced the Vuelta team so early with Ayuso. This is a perception based on what we see in sports, and how these kinds of blackmailing of athletes through the journalist.
The timing of rumours of Ayuso's team change, followed by the same journalist launching the Vuelta rumor two days later, was too obvious LOL.