Tom Dumoulin, winner of the 2017 Giro d’Italia and second in both the 2018 Giro and Tour de France, will transfer from Sunweb to Jumbo-Visma for 2020.
Insiders with connections close to Dumoulin and the teams explained to Cycling Weekly the biggest transfer of 2019/2020.
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The confirmation, they say, will only come after the 2019 Tour ends on Sunday so that Steven Kruijswijk can calmly race for the overall win for team Jumbo-Visma without thinking about Dumoulin joining.
Dumoulin is not racing the 2019 Tour de France due to a crash and knee pains from the Giro d’Italia in May.
The Dutch WorldTour team would pay Dumoulin 2.5 million euro a year according to our estimates. It would also supply him with something Sunweb could not, a strong arsenal for the Grand Tours.
“It is clear, he is not happy with the riders that the team signed over the last winter,” one Sunweb rider said off the record.
Dumoulin will join the team with Steven Kruijswijk in 2020 (Sunada)
Another explained that the team or Dumoulin have not said anything yet about his rumoured departure, but that they would like to know so that it clear what direction the Sunweb team is going in for 2020.
Without Dumoulin, Sunweb would continue to rely on Wilco Kelderman for Grand Tours and star Michael Matthews for sprints and Classics.
Dumoulin would leave Sunweb two years early, breaking a contract that runs through 2021.
Before the Tour, Dutch media reported the rumour. It underlined that the 28-year-old Dutchman was unhappy with materials at the start of 2018 when he was time trial world champion and he was unhappy with the lack of new support riders for him this last winter.
It would end an eight-year run with the team, which he represented through the Argos/Shimano/Giant iterations.
Dutch WorldTour team Jumbo-Visma welcomes Dumoulin with open arms assuming the contract is broken as sources reported. They said the team have already agreed with Dumoulin to ride in their yellow colours for 2020.
Jumbo, just like they did with the Wout van Aert transfer ahead of 2019, reportedly shelled out the euro to help make the Dumoulin switch happen. Dumoulin’s estimated contract of €2.5m would fall shy of Thomas’s €3.9m (£3.5m). Dumoulin currently earns around €1.5m.
Jumbo-Visma, according to sources and those with Slovenian connections, will keep Primož Roglič in its roster. “He isn’t bothered about having Dumoulin join,” said a Slovenian insider who knows Roglič.
Roglič placed fourth overall in the 2018 Tour behind Thomas. This spring, Roglič won every stage race he entered before the Giro d’Italia, where he led for five days before placing third overall.
Sunweb could, however, become even stronger without Dumoulin if it merges with Mathieu van der Poel’s Corendon-Circus team, as one source said is likely to happen. In June, Swedish investment company Triton confirmed it would add the Corendon Holiday Group to its business that already included Sunweb.
Contacted by Cycling Weekly earlier in Tour, neither Jumbo-Visma nor Sunweb would confirm the Dumoulin deal happening.
Dumoulin’s agent, who also represents Kelderman and Kruijswijk, said when contacted about the deal: “We are in talks with Team Sunweb management. At the moment there is no question of a deal with another team.”
