Orica-GreenEdge backing Gerrans at Vattenfall Cyclassics

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Orica-GreenEdge will head to the Vattenfall Cyclassics — the only WorldTour race held in Germany — with Simon Gerrans as its leader.

The Australian road race champion will be lining up for just his second race after he withdrew from the Tour de France. Five members of the GreenEdge Tour team will be racing in Hamburg.

The race is expected to be decided by a bunch sprint and the team's sport director Matt White explained the team roster selection for the race was based on likelihood of the fast bunch finish.

"Gerro (Gerrans) will be the guy we will look to in the sprint," White said. "Traditionally this race evolves into a sprint for the victory, the weather conditions tending to determine the size of the group.

"Sometimes we have had a group as small as 25 riders contest the sprint and in some years we have had maybe more than 100.

Last year the race was won by John Degenkolb (Giant-Shimano) in a big bunch sprint with the first group containing 82 riders.

Having won the Australian nationals in January, Gerrans then a won an historic third overall Tour Down Under victory a few weeks after before claiming the 100th edition of Liège-Bastogne-Liège in April and will be hungry for another victory in 2014.

White added that the team will be looking to get into the breakaways during the race so they have two cards to play and double their chances for victory.

"We have the likes of Albasini, Yates and Keukeleire who are the guys we would be looking to have in the moves," White said. "Usually there is always a breakaway on the circuit and it always gets reeled in just in time. But the plan for us is to be present in those breakaways because maybe this is the year that it doesn’t get reeled, you can never tell."

Matt Goss has also been selected for the team and will offer another option if the race is to be decided in a bunch sprint.

Orica-GreenEdge at the Vattenfall Cyclassics: Jens Keukeleire, Luke Durbridge, Mathew Hayman, Matthew Goss,.Michael Albasini, Simon Gerrans, Simon Yates and Svein Tuft.