"We didn't find any indication that he was being excluded or bullied" - BORA - hansgrohe unsure of Cian Uijtdebroeks' story on whatsapp group

After Cian Uijtdebroeks' departure from BORA - hansgrohe, a rumour surged that the team had a whatsapp group created during the Vuelta a España where several teammates were talking behind his back. The team took on measures to find this, however there was no indication of it.

“This was a bad thing for the team and for the sport. There is now a solution and we want to leave it at that. But we do take this matter seriously," team DS Rolf Aldag told Het Laatste Nieuws. The Belgian clearly left the team on bad terms, and broke his contract on the 1st of December - then soon signing for Team Visma | Lease a Bike. He did not say it himself, Dutch journalist hinted at the creation of a group without him.

“You don't want that in your team. We have investigated that. We have spoken to all our riders, but we really haven't found anything." At the time, Uijtdebroeks had already been vocal about Aleksandr Vlasov wanting to be the team's best placed rider, and creating an internal competition, in the same race. Regardless of that group having existed or not, it would've likely not played much of a role as the 20-year old looked set to leave in any scenario.

“That of course says nothing about the emotion that Cian felt. I'm just saying that we didn't find any indication that he was being excluded or bullied," Aldag argues. "What still bothers me is: if something happened in the Vuelta, why didn't he immediately put it on the table?”