Alessio - winners for the past two years of the Giro Team competition, suffered a major blow when Danielle De Paoli was sensationally sacked. He was named in the squad to ride the Tour de France along with Davide Casarotto, Laurent Dufaux, Ivan Gotti, Martin Hvastija, Ruslan Ivanov, Cristian Moreni and Aleksandr Shefer, the team is a well-run squad that would have been targetting the Team Competition as their main focus.

De Paoli, 29, already previously convicted of dopage, was discovered at the Tour of Switzerland with forbidden products. This has likely put an end to de Paoli’s career. The former Mercatone Uno rider was to have participated in the Tour of France, but will now be substituted.