Caleb Ewan has said that his Lotto-Dstny team "has made it clear they would prefer me to leave" as his troubled 2023 season suffers another setback with a wrist injury.
The Australian sprinter was unable to finish his last race, Sunday's Gooikse Pijl, due to the injury, and was unable to take the start of Wednesday's Omloop van het Houtland having been diagnosed with right wrist tendinopathy.
"He suffers acute tendinopathy of the right wrist and is currently being treated in Belgium. It is not clear yet when Caleb will return to action," Lotto-Dstny said on Wednesday, confirming his absence from the race.
Ewan told Nieuwsblad at the weekend that he assumes he'll still be at the team for 2024, even if he is unwanted by team manager Stephane Heulot after their relationship became strained after he abandoned the Tour de France.
"As we speak, I assume that I will still be racing for the team next year, but I don't know what's going to happen," Ewan said. "The team has made it clear that they would prefer me to leave, but I still have a contract."
"What happened happened. What's said is said," Ewan indicated of his difficult summer and tension with team management.
"Sometimes those things happen in professional sports. It is what it is. Have we talked yet? Stéphane and I don't speak that much, but we didn't do that before either.”
29-year-old Ewan, who this season has won the Van Merksteijn Fences Classic and recorded eight other podium places, recently returned to racing for the first time since his Tour de France abandon, taking part in the GP de Fourmies and Kampioenschap van Vlaanderen before Gooikse Pijl.
The July Grand Tour had marked an escalation in the tension between Ewan and his team, with Lotto-Dstny reportedly having pushed back on his requests to ride the Critérium du Dauphiné ahead of the Tour, instead sending him to the Baloise Belgium Tour.
After Ewan pulled out of the Tour on stage 12 to the Grand Colombier, Heulot took to the press to criticise Ewan, who had struggled during sprint stages after recording promising second and third places during the first week.
"I don't know how to handle this kind of character," the Frenchman told L'Equipe after a fatigued Ewan withdrew, also telling Sporza that the sprinter "mentally was not in great shape."
Ewan's management was quick to hit back at the team, calling it "dangerous" and "outdated" to openly discuss the sprinter's mental wellbeing in the press. Heulot has since said that Ewan being under contract for 2024 "is an issue", adding that the team wouldn't stop him if he wanted to move.
A statement issued by the team gave no timeline on Ewan's return to racing, which, at this late point in the season and with his future seemingly uncertain, could mean he has raced for the final time in Lotto-Dstny colours.
Heulot, who joined the team at the end of 2022 and ends his first season as manager with the team ninth in the UCI rankings – albeit with seven fewer race wins than in 2022 – spoke once more on Ewan's situation with the team.
“He has his idea about it, I have mine," Heulot told Nieuwsblad.
"As chef d'équipe, I said what I wanted to say. But we're both professionals, it's not like we're at war with each other. The intention is not to further damage Caleb's career. We both want Caleb to end up in the best possible situation.”
