Seixas leads nearly all French team against Pogačar at Liège-Bastogne-Liège

Wherever Tadej Pogačar starts, he is usually the top favourite — but many are hoping that Paul Seixas can make life difficult for the world champion on Sunday at Liège-Bastogne-Liège. The French supertalent of Decathlon CMA CGM won La Flèche Wallonne on Wednesday and now knows who will support him in his goal to dethrone Tadej Pogačar.

He is only nineteen, but he already looks ready to take on the very best. Seixas made his definitive breakthrough at last year's European Championships, finishing third behind Pogačar and Remco Evenepoel. This year that breakthrough has been emphatically confirmed: the Frenchman has won the Faun-Ardèche Classic, the Tour of the Basque Country, and now the Flèche Wallonne.

For that mission, Seixas has a loyal group of domestiques behind him. Decathlon CMA CGM announced their Liège squad on Friday: alongside Seixas himself, the French team will line up with Léo Bisiaux, Stan Dewulf, Jordan Labrosse, Paul Lapeira, Antoine L'Hote and Nicolas Prodhomme.

The team leader is raring to go. "Liège-Bastogne-Liège will be the second Monument of my career, after the Tour of Lombardy last year. Since this winter I have made it the big goal of my spring. It's a mythical race and I can't wait to discover it," Seixas said in a team statement.

And he is not going in blind. "I already know that this race suits my qualities well. That's why it's great that I actually rode La Doyenne once as a junior. That's a completely different story, of course — but I have a lot of confidence, and I can't wait to measure myself against the best riders in the world."