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Remember the last game at the old Wembley Stadium? Or the Euro ’96 semi-final?
Or countless other football matches involving England and Germany.
Yes it’s football I’m talking about but the bottom line remains the same.
When it’s a really big day for English sport and there’s a German in the mix, it’s inevitable that the Germans win.
And so it was today as Marcel Kittel repeated his feat of twelve months ago and claimed line honours and the yellow jersey on the opening stage into an insanely jam-packed Harrogate.
Whether Mark Cavendish would’ve won had he not crashed we’ll never know, but what we do know is that the Manxman is starting to build quite a dossier of these kind of incidents.
Stage 10, in last year’s Tour de France when He took out Tom Veelers and ironically Kittel won.
And three crashes in 2012, at the Giro, the Tour of Britain and the Tour of Qatar.
Cavendish didn’t cause all those crashes, and you could argue that as a sprinter in the finale, he’s always going to be at risk of a fall. But when I think of someone like Robbie McEwen, as prolific a winner as there’s been in the modern era, I don’t think he would’ve crashed today, or on the other occasions when Cav has come to grief.
Is it time to acknowledge that while Mark Cavendish is fast, he is not the best bike handler in the peloton?
And could you say that the extra pressure of seeing Marcel Kittel dominating more and more races, is pushing Cavendish into trying desperate things?
To both propositions, I say yes.
Cav wants success so bad, he sometimes makes mistakes. And when he does they are big ones.
The early images looked terrible for Cavendish but soon enough there were reports that Cavendish did not suffer any broken bones.
Watching Cavendish fall on his shoulder, at that speed, for him not to break anything would be a miracle.
Assuming Cavendish hasn’t broken anything then his boss Patrick Lefevere wants him to ride.
Lefevere: “If nothing’s broken, Mark will continue”.
Watching a replay of the crash, Cavendish moved to his left, away from the wheel of Peter Sagan. He was moving into a space occupied by Simon Gerrans, who had Europcar’s Bryan Coquard to his left.
It was a gap for two riders and Cav was the third man in. He used his head to try and make more room, touching Gerrans pedal in the process and bringing their day to a bumpy, scary end.
It was a silly move, and could’ve caused serious damage.
At the 2010 Tour Cavendish’s current lead out man Mark Renshaw was thrown out of the race for head-butting Julian Dean.
You could argue Cavendish’s actions were no different, and he too should be thrown out or at least relegated.
As I write the race Commissaires summary has been released, and the Manxman has not been penalised.
The medical report says he has a separated shoulder which suggests nothing is broken.
So what do you think?
Is it a fair decision or one made with two days of racing in England and a couple of million British cycling fans in mind?
Mark Cavendish may not have won today but if you ask me, on two fronts he was extremely lucky.
Stage 2 can’t come soon enough.
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