Cancellara’s Classics column: Attack might be Mathieu van der Poel’s best form of defence in chaotic Tour of Flanders

Everything we thought we knew about the Tour of Flanders has changed over the last week. After E3 Saxo Classic and Gent-Wevelgem, everybody had an idea of how the Ronde might play out. It was clear that Mathieu van der Poel was going to be the favourite, but we expected Wout van Aert would be in the mix too, and we could see that Lidl-Trek had the strength in numbers to make the race very interesting.

After that crash at Dwars door Vlaanderen, the Tour of Flanders suddenly looks very different. Wout is out, and that was the headline news, but Lidl-Trek were also badly affected. Jasper Stuyven, who looked so good at Harelbeke, is out of the Ronde, and so is Alex Kirsch, while Mads Pedersen also fell.

We don’t know how Mads will be affected physically by his fall, but losing Stuyven changes his race tactically. After Gent-Wevelgem, where Stuyven and Jonathan Milan were up there with Pedersen in the break of seven riders, I put the Lidl-Trek collective up there alongside Van der Poel as a favourite for the Tour of Flanders.

They would have entered this race confident that they could use their numbers to put Van der Poel under pressure, but it’s a little bit different now that they’ve lost some major people. Lidl-Trek might still find a way to win on Sunday, of course, but this isn’t their full line-up and that will surely change how they race.