With the launching of the team for 2011 confirmed recently by the Schleck brothers, more details are emerging about the likely line-up for the new, as yet anonymous team to be based in Luxembourg.
As expected, many of those who competed with Team Saxo Bank are expected to line out with Andy and Frank Schleck, including Jakob Fuglsang, Stuart O’Grady, Jens Voigt and Dominic Klemme.
According to Biciciclismo, these six riders will be joined by seven others, namely Team Milram team-mates Linus Gerdemann and Fabian Wegman, the Italian sprinter Daniele Bennati (Liquigas-Doimo), 2009 Tour de France stage winner Brice Feillu (Vacansoleil), Maxime Monfort (HTC-Columbia), Joost Posthuma (Rabobank) and Robert Wagner (Skil-Shimano).
Those thirteen are billed as certainties, or near-certainties, while two others are said to be probable additions to the team. They are two more Saxo Bank riders – Anders Lund and Laurent Didier.
In all, there are expected to be approximately 25 riders on the team, leaving ten more names to be either signed or revealed.
There have been very little details released about the project, with the name of the sponsors still not announced. The radio silence prompted speculation that the team might have run into difficulties, but those rumours were dispelled in a short message by Frank Schleck on August 14th.
“Next year we, Andy and myself, will be part of an amazing project based in our home country,” he wrote on Twitter. “It will be the NEW BIG TEAM in professional cycling. More news to follow in the coming month.”
Former Team Saxo Bank employees Brian Nygaard and Kim Andersen will be running the setup. Nygaard was working in the early part of this year as press officer for Team Sky, while Andersen was part of Saxo Bank until he and Bjarne Riis parted ways prior to the start of the Tour de France.