"It's a bit like Federer versus Nadal" - Mathieu van der Poel vs Wout van Aert among the great sporting rivalries according to Thijs Zonneveld

This Sunday, one of the great cyclocross rivalries will be renewed as Mathieu van der Poel and Wout van Aert do battle in Lievin at the 2025 Cyclocross World Championships. In the opinion of ex-pro turned analyst Thijs Zonneveld, the meeting marks a must watch occasion for cycling fans.

"That is always a duel, because they have been riding against each other for so long," begins Zonneveld's assessment on the podcast 'In het Wiel'. "Certainly when they turned pro, Van der Poel was a bit better before that, and Van Aert became world champion in cross three times in a row, they really weighed against each other."

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Although their presence in cyclocross has become more limited over recent years, if anything the rarity of the modern Van der Poel / Van Aert duals only makes them all the more anticipated when they do arrive. And whilst it's the Dutch, reigning world champion who starts as favourite, it would hardly be a massive surprise to see the Belgian team celebrating a victory on Sunday.

"The beautiful thing about that duel is that they kept changing positions. There are few duels in sports where two stars are so evenly matched," Zonneveld continues. "It's a bit like Federer versus Nadal. In many duels, one party structurally becomes the superior party, that hasn't been the case for a long time with Van Aert and Van der Poel."

If Van Aert were to win this year's Rainbow Jersey, it could also mirror Van der Poel's success from 2023. "The World Championship that Van Aert was going to win, because Van der Poel was messing around and was coming off a bad season. In the lion's den, Van Aert was going to become world champion, because he was so much better in the weeks before," recalls Zonneveld. "But at the World Championships it turned and Van der Poel started attacking from lap one. We heard from the team that he was really deep, that he had enormous doubts and did not know how to beat Van Aert. Van Aert had certainly made progress in the Grand Tours and he felt that he almost had no dominance anymore."

"If Van Aert had won, Mathieu would really have become the inferior party. And he would have received eight seconds. The opposite happened. In the final round he did something unexpected. Before Van Aert knew what was happening, Van der Poel started sprinting and became world champion," Zonneveld concludes. "He relaunched his career there. He became more serious, more fixated on winning big races and he gained more self-confidence. And it is also the moment that Van Aert became a bit less."

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