{"id":108978,"date":"2025-09-02T11:26:10","date_gmt":"2025-09-02T11:26:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/108978\/"},"modified":"2025-09-02T11:26:10","modified_gmt":"2025-09-02T11:26:10","slug":"he-is-not-behaving-like-a-leader","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/108978\/","title":{"rendered":"He is not behaving like a leader"},"content":{"rendered":"

UAE Team Emirates – XRG<\/a> has already won three stages after the first week of the Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a<\/a>. However, instead of praise, the team is receiving a lot of criticism. This is because Jo\u00e3o Almeida is often left on his own in the mountains, despite having a very strong team. Renaat Schotte and Jos\u00e9 De Cauwer also see a weak UAE, but they point to another problem with the team.First of all, De Cauwer saw a very strong Jonas Vingegaard in the ninth stage<\/a>, with a team that is constantly there for him. “Visma | Lease a Bike is clearly the most controlling team here, and Vingegaard is also the best rider,” said the analyst at Sporza<\/a>. \u201cEverything is focused on winning in Madrid. How are we going to do that? Stay together, work together.\u201d It resulted in his second stage victory in the ninth stage.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you see the UAE Team Emirates… I’m not going to say they’re a loose cannon, but they’re not there. One rider wins a stage and then lets it go. You can’t talk about a collective at UAE for the time being,\u201d said the Belgian. But team leader Almeida is far from blameless. \u201cFor me, Jo\u00e3o Almeida is not behaving like a leader. You always have to be close to Vingegaard. If you can’t keep up, that’s fine. But if you’re not there, well, then you’re Almeida.\u201d<\/p>\n

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

\"joao-almeida\"\/<\/p>\n

Almeida should be able to do better himself, De Cauwer argues.<\/p>\n

De Cauwer praises Visma, but hopes Jorgenson takes next step<\/p>\n

As a result, the Portuguese rider is almost 40 seconds behind his Danish rival. Things are not looking good for the UAE team leader, but an overall victory in the Vuelta is not out of the question yet. \u201cHe can definitely still win it,\u201d says the former sports director. \u201cIt\u2019s only the first rest day. There\u2019s still a long way to go. The only question is what Vingegaard will do there, if he can already pull away so far here.\u201d<\/p>\n

On top of that, Visma <\/a>| Lease a Bike has been way more on point than its big rivals so far. With Sepp Kuss (16th) and Matteo Jorgenson (8th), they still have two guys in the top 20. The American is still in the running for a podium spot. “But I expect him to do even better, immediately after Almeida. In the Tour, too, he was just that little bit short of being able to keep up with Vingegaard.”<\/p>\n

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

\"matteo-jorgenson\"\/<\/p>\n

Visma | Lease a Bike is riding an excellent Vuelta so far.<\/p>\n

Schotte on the Vuelta route: “The stages were often not very exciting”<\/p>\n

So far, Schotte thinks the Vuelta has been a mixed bag, with not too many interesting routes. \u201cIt\u2019s been a bit of a Tour of Spain that is searching for its identity for its 80th edition. The stages were often unexciting, with a long buildup and then a sudden burst of fireworks at the end. We can say that Vingegaard has set things alight and that the dull opening week has now taken on a different momentum.”<\/p>\n

De Cauwer counters, however, and sees that it is precisely in the less obvious stages that the danger (or rather the entertainment) lies. \u201cI’m looking forward to a stage where the race takes a surprise turn. An attack you don’t see coming, like Vingegaard’s. That’s not what you expect from him.\u201d On Tuesday, the Vuelta continues with a stage that is almost identical to Sunday’s: a relatively flat stage with an uphill finish.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"UAE Team Emirates – XRG has already won three stages after the first week of the Vuelta a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":108979,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[4985,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-108978","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cycling","8":"tag-cycling","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108978","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=108978"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108978\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/108979"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=108978"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=108978"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=108978"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}