Tour de France 2021 – “The Ineos are looming” – Bradley Wiggins expects an attack from Richard Carapaz and co on stage 16

Bradley Wiggins predicts a big step for the Ineos team on the 17th stage of the Tour de France.

“Ineos is about to do something,” he said.

“It’s a big deal and that’s why today was a bit of a lull in action,” he added.

When asked if he thinks Pogacar could be caught, Wiggins was careful not to rule him out entirely but said it would take a big collapse from the yellow jersey holder.

“We’ll see. It’s this interesting battle between Carapaz and (Jonas) Vingegaard,” Wiggins said.

“And when Vingegaard gets up high like that, it seems to pull him away a bit. I look forward to tomorrow. I think we’ll see an upheaval in GC.

“I don’t know which way. Maybe the podium, maybe the yellow jersey. It will be a big request. Something’s going to be wrong with Pogacar to lose this jersey at this stage, but you never know about the Tour de France. “

Another interesting battle is the green jersey race, with Mark Cavendish still in charge.

BikeExchange rider Michael Matthews, however, has made strides to reattach Cavendish and Wiggins believes his team will throw everything at the green jersey rider in the next race.

“Matthews is not going to win a sprint against Cav (Cavendish),” Wiggins explained.

“He’s not going to win a stage – he always fails because of the severity of the stages and he’s a bit of a middle ground between the sprinter and the puncher.

“But by racking up points like he was, he became a serious threat to Cav’s green jersey. We have to hope Cav for the next few days, because Michael has a job and he seems to be getting back into shape.

“I think [Cavendish’s] the team will rally around him, ”he continued.

“Bike Exchange, they will do everything possible tomorrow to get those first bonus points for Matthews.

“If he gets them back, he gets closer to ten, 15 points. Then it comes to the thread. It’s a race in itself and it looks interesting. “

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