Early in the stage a group of five riders succeeded in creating a gap with the peloton. It was partly thanks to the men of Team Jumbo-Visma that the escapees were caught at four kilometres from the finish. In the final hectic kilometres the inexperienced team lacked the finesse to properly execute their sprint plans.

Sports director Jan Boven was disappointed with the missed sprint opportunity. “Our goal today was to sprint for the victory. At a certain point in the race we had to make a sacrifice in order to let it come to a sprint at all. After the leaders were caught, a hectic occurred situation. We lacked the power to drop Dylan off in an ideal situation.”

Before the sprinters get a second chance on Sunday, there is a stage in the Walloon Ardennes tomorrow. “It’s the queen stage of this race”, Boven clarified. “Koen Bouwman is riding very strong, Pascal Eenkhoorn is eager to show himself and in Finn Fisher-Black we have a third rider at a good position in the classification. It will be a battle between the classification riders. In addition, of course, there is the possibility of a stage win, so it promises to be an interesting day.”