Is Cavendish's move to Sky a good choice?

Cycling’s worst kept secret has finally been revealed, with Mark Cavendish confirming he is heading to Team Sky; but is the Manx missile making the right choice?

There have long been rumours that Cav was heading to the British-based team, but his hand was forced when HTC decided to pull out of cycling. The newly crowned World Road Champion will be joining some of the men who helped him take the title in Copenhagen. Including this year’s Vuelta successes, Bradley Wiggins and Chris Froome, and Welshman Geraint Thomas. Other Grand Tour are Edvald Boasson-Hagen and, for the first time, another Manxman Peter Kennaugh. So, do Sky have the mother of all teams or the mother of all nightmares?

This really could go either way for the team; with so many cooks though it is far too easy to spoil the broth. Cav will be heartened that his right-hand man, Bernie Eisel, will be joining him and is one tick on the list for a lead out train. Thomas worked hard for Cavendish in the World Championships and helped him get to the front, when he had fallen so far back in the group. Will the Welsh rider want to sacrifice chances of his own, to get Cav the vital stage wins in a Grand Tour? I can’t imagine he is going to hang back on the mountains to make sure Cav makes it over in time.

In the past Cav has had teammates who have given up their own dreams to help him out and hope he would give them a symbolic victory, somewhere down the line. Even the best get tired out helping out their team leader and Fabian Cancellara was a prime example, when he just slid in to the top ten in the 2010 Tour de France individual time-trial. Wiggins (and now Froome) has his own Grand Tour hopes; the 31-year-old is running out of time to take victory in one of the big three and will want to take all the chances he has.

The person I feel sorry for in this whole thing is Ben Swift; he is going to turn in to the talented version of Andre Greipel. Boasson-Hagen is safe, because he is different kind of sprinter and is not too bad on the mountains. Swift has had a good year, winning five big stages in 2011. He is now going to have to settle for the races Cav doesn’t want.

Sky have either got the recipe for a perfect year or an unmitigated disaster. We’ve either got a Schleck type love in or we’re going to have a Lance Armstrong and Alberto Contador type war. However it ends, I am looking forward to the 2012 season.