Tadej Pogačar is missing two vital domestiques for the Spring Classics – How could this hinder his dominance and hopes of winning Milan-San Remo and Paris-Roubaix?

While he himself has not raced yet in 2026, the multitude of crashes that have plagued the early racing season have been unkind to Tadej Pogačar, with several of his key UAE Team Emirates-XRG lieutenants for the Classics now out with injury.

Tim Wellens's injury is the latest blow to UAE's firepower, crashing hard at Kuurne-Brussel-Kuurne on Sunday and suffering a right collarbone fracture. The Belgian Champion confirmed yesterday on his Instagram that there would be no Classics campaign for him this year.

"The 2026 Classics are over before they even began. Right clavicle fractured. Surgery went well thanks to the excellent medical team at the hospital, and the recovery process has already started," said Wellens.

"Very disappointed to miss the upcoming races, but I’ll be fully supporting my teammates from home. Thank you everyone for all the messages — replies might be a bit slower for now with only one arm."

Wellens joins Jhonatan Narváez as the highest-profile missing pieces in Pogačar's ideal support squad for his one-day racing calendar, with the Ecuadorian Champion out of action due to sustaining "several stable thoracic vertebrae compression fractures" in a crash at the Tour Down Under in January.

Looking back to last season, it was Wellens who was the last man alongside Pogacar at Strade Bianche before he and Tom Pidcock moved away from the rest of the field in the last 80 kilometres, before he then rode to third on his own. He will be sorely missed in Saturday's race.

Two weeks later at Milan-San Remo, Wellens was the second last man and Narváez the final man in UAE's rapid lead-out up the Cipressa, where Pogačar launched an all-out assault on the course that only Filippo Ganna and eventual race-winner Mathieu van der Poel could follow in full.

In the Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix, Pogačar freelanced more in the key stages, latching onto the moves of Van der Poel and Mads Pedersen (Lidl-Trek), but Narváez was part of the squad at the former, Wellens in both, and they would've played an essential role in the early positioning.

Mikkel Bjerg also raced both cobbled Monuments as support for the Slovenian in 2025 – featuring especially strongly in Flanders, which is no surprise as a former top-five finisher in his own right – but UAE may be without his support, too, after he was forced to abandon the Tour Down Under with a fractured hand and AC joint, caused by a kangaroo running into the peloton.

How could missing pieces affect the World Champion's chances?

It's not to say that UAE won't still have one of the strongest line-ups for all of Pogačar's planned five one-day races, with the likes of Isaac del Toro, Florian Vermeersch, Nils Politt, Jan Christen and António Morgado all showing previously that they can step up in such races.

But Narváez and Wellens could be leaders on almost every other team, as they were at Ineos Grenadiers and Lotto in the past, and they provided crucial lead-outs and positioning, which allowed the World Champion to blast away on the sections which suited him best.

His excellence at Strade Bianche across three editions (2022, 2024 and 2025) suggests that there should be little problem repeating, especially considering Del Toro's growth as an overall rider and his second-place finish on the gravel stage into Siena during last year's Giro d'Italia.

And Vermeersch has already made a flying start to the Classics, taking third at Omloop Het Nieuwsblad and arguably looking the second strongest on the key climbs behind Van der Poel. He's also the current Gravel World Champion, so he will be no stranger to the rough roads.

It's Milan-San Remo and the Cobbled Classics where the problems seem more possible for the Slovenian.

At the former, positioning into the Cipressa will be key, as always, and Pogačar, without his two top supporting riders from last year, will be relying on the talent of Del Toro to deliver him.

He's more than capable power-wise, but the young Mexican actually missed his spot in the Cipressa lead-out last season, which could have been the difference between distancing Van der Poel and Ganna and not, so he will have to shoulder that pressure and deliver if Pogačar is to finally win San Remo.

In Flanders and Roubaix, yes, Pogačar is able to freestyle and get himself out of trouble a lot of the time, which is enough when he can kick things off with more than 100km remaining and remove the teammate element.

But again, when it comes to positioning, sometimes even one teammate also being among the best riders in the race can be enough to get the rainbow bands to where he needs to be – usually Van der Poel's wheel.

Narváez and Wellens have long both been able to do this job, but can Vermeersch or someone like Politt do it in their absence? The answer is probably yes, but it will be no easy feat, and teams like Alpecin-Premier Tech, Visma-Lease a Bike and Lidl-Trek will and should look to exploit this gap in team strength.

Ultimately, though, Pogačar will probably start as the strongest or second-strongest – behind Van der Poel – rider in all of the one-day races he will race in 2026, so though his team's role could be major, getting him close to the wheels he needs to be on should well be enough to see him extend his Monument tally of 10 and equal or surpass Roger De Vlaeminck, and only have less than the great Eddy Merckx.

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