{"id":149733,"date":"2025-09-17T12:40:09","date_gmt":"2025-09-17T12:40:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/149733\/"},"modified":"2025-09-17T12:40:09","modified_gmt":"2025-09-17T12:40:09","slug":"do-you-think-uae-even-blinks-at-pogacars-salary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/149733\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cDo you think UAE even blinks at Pogacar\u2019s salary?\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

Thijs Zonneveld<\/a>, in the podcast In De Waaier<\/a>, looked for concrete solutions to a problem that could become bigger than ever in cycling. Now that the Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a<\/a> has been overshadowed by political protests, the fear\u2014already voiced by Michal Kwiatkowski<\/a>\u2014is that this will happen more often in the future. Zonneveld points to Israel, but to other cases too.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s important that cycling as a whole, including the organizers, the UCI, and all the teams, starts thinking about how to deal with this,\u201d he began. \u201cYou can keep pretending that sport and politics should remain separate, but that\u2019s simply not the case. Especially when you look at the kinds of sponsors entering cycling.\u201d<\/p>\n

Those sponsors often have a lot of money, but also a questionable image. \u201cCycling is used far more than other sports to whitewash sponsors\u2019 reputations,\u201d Zonneveld said, referring to the term sportswashing. \u201cWe need to have a serious discussion about that in cycling, instead of burying our heads in the sand about where the money comes from.\u201d<\/p>\n

Continue reading below the photo<\/p>\n

\"israel<\/p>\n

Cycling desperately needs \u201cdirty\u201d money, Zonneveld knows<\/p>\n

The problem is: cycling is a sponsor-driven sport, and teams rely on sponsors to cover all costs. \u201cDodgy\u201d sponsors often bring in a lot of money, which directly impacts the quality of a cycling team. \u201cThe big difference with other sports is that cycling itself doesn\u2019t generate money. There are many teams just hoping they\u2019ll still exist next year,\u201d Zonneveld explained.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat economically unstable climate means that anyone who puts even a bag of money on the table is immediately taken seriously. There\u2019s hardly any choice, that\u2019s incredibly tough. The sport is very vulnerable to sportswashing.\u201d And so the chance that people will protest against those big sponsors with \u201cdirty\u201d money is higher. \u201cYou can expect that this will happen, and that it will keep happening more often.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\"palestina-protest-vuelta\"\/<\/p>\n

\u201cUCI and ASO don\u2019t care about economic stability\u201d<\/p>\n

As Zonneveld stressed, Israel isn\u2019t the only sponsor currently under heavy criticism. \u201cUAE, Bahrain, the World Championships in Rwanda,\u201d the Dutchman listed. \u201cThere should be a human rights clause in sport, something like FIFA did years ago around the World Cup in Qatar. And then they handed the World Cup to Saudi Arabia\u2026 that makes you look completely ridiculous.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe same goes for cycling,\u201d he continued. \u201cSoon we\u2019re heading to Rwanda, where an opposition leader was arrested without any legal grounds and thrown in prison. That\u2019s happening right now. And in the neighboring country, there\u2019s a civil war being sponsored by Rwanda. And then we go there and pretend we\u2019re just going to race. I find that incredibly na\u00efve.\u201d<\/p>\n

Continue reading below the photo<\/p>\n

\"uae-team-emirates\"\/<\/p>\n

Zonneveld sees UAE as a \u201cbig sports team\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s just very little money in cycling, and do you think UAE even blinks at Pogacar\u2019s salary?\u201d Zonneveld asked. \u201cHe wins so many races, with UAE written big across his chest. When people talk about UAE, it\u2019s no longer about human rights. No, it\u2019s simply seen as a very successful sports team. That\u2019s what sportswashing does.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s a very tricky discussion, but cycling can\u2019t keep saying it doesn\u2019t care.\u201d And what\u2019s the solution? \u201cMaking cycling more economically stable,\u201d said Zonneveld. \u201cThat way, a team doesn\u2019t have to blindly accept every bag of money. But the UCI and ASO, as the two biggest players, don\u2019t care about economic stability. So they\u2019re the ones you\u2019ll have to convince.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Thijs Zonneveld, in the podcast In De Waaier, looked for concrete solutions to a problem that could become…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":149734,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[569],"tags":[64,63,784,85],"class_list":["post-149733","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cycling","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149733","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=149733"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149733\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/149734"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=149733"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=149733"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=149733"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}