Unlucky 13th for Aussie
MICHAEL Matthews admits his green jersey hopes are at the crossroads after he was blown away by a furious finale to Stage 10.
The Australian was left without answers as explosive rival Marcel Kittel took his fourth-stage Tour de France win and a vice-like grip on the points classification.
On a day when Chris Froome’s 18-second general classification lead was never threatened, Matthews screamed in frustration as he crossed the line in 13th place – a result that severely dented his green jersey ambitions.
Matthews sat outside the Team Sunweb bus with his head in his hands for several minutes before being consoled by teammate Nikias Arndt.
After clawing back ground on hillier terrain, he could only watch as another Kittel masterclass on the flatlands doubled the German’s lead to 102 points.
Asked if it was still possible for him to finish in green in Paris, Matthews was matterof-fact.
“I think that’s something we have to discuss tonight. Do we keep going for it? Or do we give it a miss and stop going for the intermediate (sprints) and just go for stage wins?” Matthews said.
“I think we’ll need to have a chat with everyone tonight and see what we did wrong and what we can do better next time.”
Matthews was again irritated by what he believed was a fragile leadout that left him with too much work to do.
“My (mojo) is totally there, but there was a miscommunication with the leadout train,” he said.
While mathematically possible for Matthews to overhaul the deficit in the 11 stages before Paris, Kittel’s dominance was a hammer blow.
“I think knowing now that if I want to go for it, it’s going be a long battle,” Matthews said.
“If you want to go for that jersey you need to be up there every single day and until now I’ve been pretty consistent with that. But with this finish it’s disappointing.”
Another flat day awaits today with a 203.5km trek from Eymet to Pau before the peloton hits the Pyrenees.