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Team Astana

Page 36 - Get up to date with the latest news, scores & standings from the Cycling News Community.
Hmm but why would Martinelli court Nibali for an Astana comeback if he's on his way out as well? That at least hints that he has ongoing interests with the team.

I just don't see the big Italian sponsor popping up. The Benetton thing ain't gonna happen for 25 years now. Eolo already is with Basso & Contador. Mapei doesn't want to come back. Why would Generali group for example sponsor a cycling team. Segafredo has just prolonged its sponsorship with Trek!

UnoX would be interested to buy a world tour license and Reitangruppen should have enough money to do so if serious.
 
lol imagine replacing vino with steve bauer for the tdf, nonsensical decision.

Imagine the team merging with Israel Start-up Nation, there is a Canadian connection after all, that would be pretty bad...

inst israel start up in the world tour already, i think we are looking at a merger, it was after all seel that convinced them to onboard with a co-sponsor in the first place. maybe unox like staubsauger said.
 
There are still Kazakhs running the team (including the CEO women who was appointed by the PPSK) but it are no longer the same people with whom Vino used to work in the past and this seems to have been the case for the last couple of years.

It were Vino and Sedun who first brought in Premier Tech as a sponsor couple years ago. Since the new management arrived the Canadians have worked with the new management.
 
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There are still Kazakhs running the team (including the CEO women who was appointed by the PPSK) but it are no longer the same people with whom Vino used to work in the past and this seems to have been the case for the last couple of years.

It were Vino and Sedun who first brought in Premier Tech as a sponsor couple years ago. Since the new management arrived the Canadians have worked with the new management.
Additionally Vino, Shefer, Fofonov and also Seel are Russians while the financers are Turkish, Kazakh aren't they!?
 
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There are still Kazakhs running the team (including the CEO women who was appointed by the PPSK) but it are no longer the same people with whom Vino used to work in the past and this seems to have been the case for the last couple of years.

It were Vino and Sedun who first brought in Premier Tech as a sponsor couple years ago. Since the new management arrived the Canadians have worked with the new management.

Trying to piece together info here on whats going on.

Yana went out publicaly this january and credited herself for the lager part of the sponsorship:
In the end, it is thanks to Seel that the Canadian company Premier Tech decided after four years of sponsorship to make an extra contribution. “We have been working closely with Jean Bélanger – the CEO of Premier Tech – for many years. There were several parties in the running to join Astana as a co-sponsor, but the match with Jean was the best. It wasn't so much about the money, although that is important of course. He wants to be part of the pack, out of love for the sport. Jean doesn't want to change the team completely, but he does want to improve a number of things. In short, our vision was almost the same,” says Seel

Also one can understand why Sedun and both Vino where complaining about the constant micromanagment style

“I do all the day-to-day management,” she explains. “I also do the administration and I determine the strategic choices. We have different departments for this: a technical department, a logistics department, a financial department and now we finally have a very good marketing department, headed by Sven Jonker. I sit with each department and I make decisions based on what they propose. So basically I do the entire management of the Astana team.”



Seduns quote to Kzaif earlier this year:

He details how new management, acquired gradually by Yana Zel who was appointed as managing director three years ago, now play "first fiddle" and have driven the team into a "rigid bureaucratic framework", with bicycles being counted "two hundred times over the past few years" and forcing support staff to write "constant reports". He says he would understand these changes if the team was "flawed" and needed to be pulled out of a hole, but this is not the case, and that it's been a minor miracle the team has been able to achieve multiple major victories these past few seasons. This year, however, Astana's victory list includes only two stages of the Tour of the Basque Country.

Sedun says that over time Vinokourov (who rode for the team before becoming its general manager) was also removed from strategic decisions, left only to deal with the sporting side as the new management took over strategic and financial decisions.

Sedun then argues that although the new people in charge are successful in their own fields, they don't know a lot about bike racing, and likens it to if he was "appointed to lead the ballet troupe of the Mariinsky Theatre".

He also said that Lopez wanted to stay but the new managment didnt want him even for the same contract cost he had before.



Vino had a interview today with russian media where he basically said that he was thrown out of the team for a lack of results this year:

"As far as I know, this information was really tried to pass off as reality, but this is not true. I have no personal problems. Officially, the notification sent to me said that the decision to suspend me was made as a result of the team's poor performance this year. . However, of course, I do not agree with this. At the moment, the team has 8 wins, 33 podiums, especially since the season is not over yet and it is very strange to draw any conclusions up to suspension now"

"Why not wait until the end of the year and evaluate the season by its final results? Since 2013, I have successfully led the team as general manager, making key decisions. From 2013 to 2019, the team won more than 170 victories, won four super races, five times became winner of the Grand Tours, over the years of my leadership, Astana has become one of the top teams in the world. However, since 2019, changes have begun in the team from the side of the new management of our shareholder

"The Astana cycling team has become the hallmark of Kazakhstan on the world stage. Now that the Astana project has become one of the best teams in the world, I am very sad that I can be rudely removed from the team just because I have always openly expressed my professional opinion, which someone did not want"

He also expresses conserns and hopes Lutsenko preperation for the olympics will go well now.

Piecing together all the info it seems that Seel and Jean want the kazakh core out, Fofonov and Dimi is probably the next to go, the licence will be sold.

I dont think he is coming back to Astana from this, he will probably move in a new direction, sad!
 
Additionally Vino, Shefer, Fofonov and also Seel are Russians while the financers are Turkish, Kazakh aren't they!?
As far as I know there is some beef between Vino and the Kazakh federation.
Overall Vino's improtance as one of the countries most well known athletes seems to have declined over the last few years, since 2015 Golovkin has been clearly ahead of him and overall Boxing and amateur wrestling seem to be the most important sports in the country.
 
Vino and Lutsenko's hunting trip earlier this week starting to get results :D:D

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Cyclingnews spoke to other sources close to the team, with one stating: “At the end of the day, the thing that they wouldn’t agree on was Vinokourov. Premier Tech wanted him gone and his involvement in the team was the overriding point that the two sides couldn’t agree on. Astana have chosen to lose a major financial backer to save him, and while it hasn’t been announced that he’s coming back yet but it’s a no-brainer.”