Contador: Racing with style is more important than winning

‘The result is an imposter’. So said the footballer Xavi Hernandez in an iconic 2011 interview with the Guardian newspaper. The diminutive playmaker, describing himself as a ‘romantic’, was talking about Barcelona’s commitment to their aesthetically pleasing brand of possession-based football, in the season after they’d been knocked out of the Champions League by Jose Mourinho’s rugged and pragmatic Inter Milan side. “Other teams win and they're happy, but it's not the same,” he said. "The identity is lacking.”

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Patrick Fletcher

Patrick is an NCTJ-trained journalist, and former deputy editor of Cyclingnews, who has seven years’ experience covering professional cycling. He has a modern languages degree from Durham University and has been able to put it to some use in what is a multi-lingual sport, with a particular focus on French and Spanish-speaking riders. Away from cycling, Patrick spends most of his time playing or watching other forms of sport - football, tennis, trail running, darts, to name a few, but he draws the line at rugby.