But Widar is not the only one attracting the attention of other teams since Maxim Van Gils, under contract until 2026, is also being tracked, again according to HLN. The one who resigned in March had a very good season with a third place in the Strade Bianche and the Flèche wallonne, a fourth in Liège-Bastogne-Liège and a victory in Frankfurt. The rider would like to be revalued for these performances but the withdrawal of Dstny next year does not allow it. Van Gils’ new manager would therefore have taken the pulse of other teams regarding a possible interest on their part.
World Tour race at the centre of the battle
If Movistar is part of it, the most concrete interest would come from the Astana team. And this is no coincidence since the Kazakh team is only 21st in the UCI ranking for the 2023-2025 period and will have to finish in the top 18 teams at the end of next season to keep its World Tour team label. With a fairly significant outlay, it therefore needs to score a lot of points and has started its transfer window in this direction by going for Alberto Bettiol, Diego Ulissi, Wout Poels and Sergio Higuita. But the arrival of the new Chinese sponsor XDS allows it to see even bigger. When we know that the entire Astana team has only taken twice as many points this year as Van Gils alone, the latter could well represent its salvation in the cycling elite.
As with Widar, the Lotto-Dstny team will not want to collaborate with the departure of its rider, even if its lead in the UCI ranking for 2023-2025 is quite significant and it should not leave the top 18, even if Van Gils leaves. Despite this, the Belgian team would still be well advised to keep one of its leaders while Victor Campenaerts, Florian Vermeersch, Sylvain Moniquet and Pascal Eenkhoorn will leave the team next season.
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