"Only a great Tadej could have won this stage" - UAE team boss applauds Matteo Jorgenson's ride on Isola 2000

Starting the nineteenth stage of Tour de France with a lead of three minutes over Jonas Vingegaard, it seemed like a one last large attack would come from the Dane as he sent his best mountain domestiques up the road into the breakaway. However at the end of the day, it was the Slovenian who gained more than minute and a half - most likely the decisive advantage.

Despite Pogacar's massive lead in the GC, the UAE Team Emirates manager Mauro Gianetti reminds to stay focused at Cyclism'Actu: "No, it's not done. It's better five minutes than three, but we have to get to Nice, we have to stay focused, we have to work seriously. Today the team did something extraordinary, really strong from the start, and Tadej did Tadej, he finished off a team effort. Jorgenson set the bar very high because he was really strong, him and his team, they did something exceptional, and only a great Tadej could have won this stage."

The UAE applied a strategy prepared a long time ago: "That was the plan, the team riders had come here for three weeks, to train, to do the altitude training. They had done the climb several times, they knew the Bonette very well and also the Col de Vars. So the plan was to not leave too much of a gap to the breakaway, and then push from the bottom (of Isola 2000), and around 10 km from the finish, on the steepest part, try to make the difference."

Mauro Gianetti had a word for Jonas Vingegaard, who defended himself well on this Tour: "We saw last year, when you arrive on the Tour and you haven't really been able to work... Even if you're good, strong, like Jonas was the first two weeks... Maybe a little bit like last year, the last week Tadej had a few days where he couldn't really recover 100% from the fatigue of the previous days. So it was a great Jonas, who is having a great Tour, despite his fall, and we mustn't forget that it wasn't just a small fall."