Jos van Emden is, to put it mildly, very unhappy with the statements made by FDJ-SUEZ team manager Stephen Delcourt. The 40-year-old Frenchman said after Demi Vollering's crash in the third stage that her teammates 'were playing with lives' and that 'some teams were really disrespectful.' This did not sit well at all with Visma | Lease a Bike team director Van Emden.
"Let me be very clear: what he says is absolutely ridiculous,” the multiple Dutch time trial champion did not mince words in De Telegraaf. “I have zero respect for those comments. Apparently, he wants a peloton of eight riders, including Demi, to ride inside a golden cage. Hello, this is sport, right? Nothing happened that couldn’t happen. He’s simply influenced by Demi. By Demi’s dramatics."
Van Emden wanted to draw a line under the conversation but felt it needed to be said once and for all. "Demi really thinks she’s in a golden cage. Yes, she is the best female cyclist. But that doesn’t mean everyone has to get out of her way. And for Delcourt to say that lives are being played with is just not true. Then you’re simply out of touch with reality. You should just switch to another sport. I’ll leave it at that, but my point is clear."
Philip Roodhooft from Fenix-Deceuninck also disagreed with Delcourt but was somewhat more nuanced. "When I look at the men's Tour and how we lost Jasper Philipsen, we could have put Bryan Coquard on the pyre back then. But we didn’t, and in hindsight, it would have been very wrong. Coquard is also a sprinter, a team leader. He is expected to sprint; what else is he supposed to do? From our perspective, what happened on Monday was a racing incident. I can’t imagine anyone deliberately cutting someone off. I spoke with Puck Pieterse, and she didn’t experience it that way. So as far as we’re concerned, this is part of cycling."
