The frank verdict came on Thomas’s Watts Occurring podcast on November 4. Reflecting on the Netcompany-Ineos campaign, the 2018 Tour de France winner said the team’s standout numbers simply did not add up.

“It definitely wasn’t good,” Thomas said on the podcast. “Even though results weren’t particularly, you know, sensational, we had a lot of wins, but they were like smaller wins. It wasn’t like any big wins really.”

The numbers do him no favours. The team closed the season with 36 wins and eighth in the UCI team ranking, and no Grand Tour podium to point at. At the Tour de France, best-placed rider Egan Bernal rolled into Paris in 20th. Netcompany-Ineos was one of thirteen teams to leave France without a stage win, as Pogacar swept five stages on his way to a fifth overall title that moved him level with Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault and Miguel Indurain.

A ladder, not a cliff edge

Thomas works inside a reshaped leadership team. Dave Brailsford has returned to daily duties as team principal after CEO John Allert exited at the start of the Giro d’Italia in May, with the backdrop a five-year title deal with Danish technology group Netcompany.

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In that context, Thomas pushed back on the idea the team is miles off the pace, framing the rebuild as incremental.

“You can’t just go from 20 back to to 80 straight away. It’s like climbing a ladder, isn’t it? You can’t go from the second rung of a ladder straight to eight. You got to go to three, four, five.”

Arensman at the Giro, Onley at the Vuelta

The sharper moments came away from the Tour. Thymen Arensman finished fourth at the Giro d’Italia, 37 seconds shy of the podium, and Filippo Ganna took a time-trial stage at the race. Oscar Onley came sixth at the Vuelta a España with the young rider classification, and Ganna’s spring produced a victory at Dwars door Vlaanderen.

Those results, Thomas argued, show forward motion even if they have not converted into the marquee wins the Ineos name used to deliver.

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Back in late July, speaking to idlprocycling at the end of the Tour, he had been direct about the cost of those three weeks, pointing to crashes and punctures that wrecked any chance of rhythm.

Edinburgh Grand Départ in July

The next marker is already fixed. The 2027 Tour de France will start with a Grand Départ in Edinburgh, with stage one covering 184km from Edinburgh to Carlisle on Friday 2 July 2027, and Thomas has made clear the team sees it as a focal point.

“It’s going to be huge for the team, huge for the UK,” he told idlprocycling in July. “We really want to perform well there, it’s a great goal to have.”

Netcompany-Ineos has not yet published its roster plans for that Grand Départ.

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