UAE Team Emirates rarely make transfer mistakes – they handpick the best young talent, turn domestics into super domestics and revitalise the careers of riders in the general classification – but has the Emirates team made an uncharacteristically big mistake by not renewing Marc Hirschy’s contract and joining him at Tudor Pro Cycling from next season?
With the World Championships just days away on his home soil, the 26-year-old Swiss rider is in the best form of his career, winning five consecutive one-day races. We say five. And they weren’t easy races. First came the Clasica San Sebastián and then the Bretagne Classics, two hilly WorldTour races known for being difficult to control, before three wins in September’s Italian 4 races that serve as a prelude to the bigger autumn Classics in October. Over the course of the season, Hirsey has won six one-day races, putting him close to being the highest-ranked one-day rider this season according to the Veron Road Code rankings.
After a few years of decline, Hirschy is once again displaying the same talent and tactical nous he showed in the fall of 2020. At the time, the virtually unknown 22-year-old had burst into the spotlight in spectacular fashion with stage wins at the Tour de France and La Flèche Wallonne, and podiums at both the World Championships and Liège-Bastogne-Liège. This run of form prompted an acrimonious move from DSM to UAE.
But since then, Hirsey hasn’t lived up to expectations. He won 20 races in his four years with the team, but didn’t win at WorldTour level until San Sebastian. He has only raced two Grand Tours with the team, supporting Tadej Pogacar at the 2021 and 2022 Tour de France. A hip injury has also played a role, but it’s notable that he’s been banished from the UAE Grand Tours and relegated to smaller stage races (of which he has won three) and one-day events.
In a way, it’s no surprise that Hirschi wanted to move. It’s no coincidence that he chose Tudor, even if Tudor is a second-tier team likely to rely on wildcards to qualify for Grand Tours in the coming years. Tudor is the team of Swiss great Fabian Cancellara, who also manages Hirschi. The sales pitch was predictable: “Marc, join my team and be a leader (let’s pretend Spartacus didn’t say the same thing to Julian Alaphilippe).” Everything is set to be the perfect marriage between Hirschi, in the best period of his career and a stalwart of an ambitious team that would buy a WorldTour spot if it could. Tudor.
So did the UAE make a mistake by sanctioning Hirschy’s departure? Completing cycling with one win in every race alongside Pogačar is a clear and understandable priority for the team, but they still need other riders to contribute with results. Right now, they’re good enough in that regard; with 73 wins already this season, arguably the best in the team’s history. But by letting Hirschy leave, they lose a very regular and reliable winner who triumphs on a variety of terrains. The UAE government and Emirates may not want the limited attention that a Czech Tour win would bring, but good publicity is good publicity, regardless of how many people pay attention.
In the eight years since the Gulf took over the Lampre-Merida license, it can be said that they have only made three major transfer mistakes, when they showed the way out to Matej Mohoric, Filippo Ganna and Jasper Philipsen. In that time, they promoted Pogačar and Juan Ayuso from feeder teams, lured runners-up Isaac del Toro and Jan Kristen to the project, and turned prospects into real things in Brandon McNulty and Joao Almeida. They even gave stagnant riders like Marc Soler and Adam Yates a much-needed boost. In other words, the UAE’s transfer policy has been a complete success, with exceptions. But as Philipsen’s move to Alpecin-Deceuninck in 2021 showed, the UAE doesn’t always get it right.
On current form, it’s entirely possible that Hirschy could overtake Pogacar and win the world championships in Zurich later this month, a scenario that would delight Tudor but embarrass the UAE. Will the sport’s best team regret discarding a proven winner? And will Hirschy, who is fully backed as Tudor’s number one rider, be a thorn in the UAE’s side for years to come?