2008 Teams Preview Part 2: Credit Agricole through Gerolsteiner

For the second installment, we will look at Credit Agricole, CSC, Euskaltel, FdJeux, and Gerolsteiner.

Credit Agricole
French
Sponsor: French bank
Team Manager: Roger Legeay (France)
Key Riders: Thor Hushovd, winner of the Green Jersey and 5 stages of the Tour; Pietro Caucchioli, he has several top-10s in the Giro.
Depth: 3/10, besides Hushovd, Credit Agricole is a very weak team, and Caucchioli is getting old.
2007 Season: 4/10, Hushovd's Tour stage win was their only ProTour win in 2007; Laszlo Bodrogi finished second in the Worlds TT, but that was while riding for Hungary, not Credit Agricole.
Expectations: A Tour stage or two from Hushovd, and some decent stage race placings from Caucchioli.

CSCDanish
Sponsor: Computer Sciences Coroporation (self-explanatory)
Team Manager: Bjarne Riis (Denmark)
Key Riders: Fabian Cancellara, back-to-back World Time Trial Champion, two stages in the 2007 Tour; Stuart O'Grady, winner of last year's Paris-Roubaix; Carlos Sastre, 4th and 2nd in the 2007 Tour and Vuelta, respectively; Jens Voigt, winner of the '07 Criterium International and Tour of Germany, with a stage win in each as well; Andy Schleck, 2nd overall and Best Young rider in the Giro; Frank Schleck (Andy's older brother), winner of the '06 Tour stage to l'Alpe d'Huez and 10th overall.
Depth: 10/10; There is no one better. CSC has everything, from climbers (Sastre, the Schleck bros.), to sprinters (O'Grady, J.J. Haedo), to time triallists (Cancellara, Bobby Julich), to classics riders (O'Grady, Cancellara, Voigt, Frank Schleck).
2007 Season: 10/10, the best team in the world, hands down. 14 ProTour wins, and second places in the and Giro and Vuelta.
Expectations: A Grand Tour win and more of the dominance we saw last year.

Euskaltel-Euskadi
Basque (Spanish)
Sponsors: The Basque telephone company and regional government, respectively.
Team Manager: Miguel Madariga
Key Riders: Sammy Sanchez, 3rd overall and three stage wins in the Vuelta; Haimar Zubeldia, 5th overall in the Tour; Mikel Astarloza, 9th overall in the Tour.
Depth: 6/10, a solid squad, especially in the high mountains of stage races.
2007 Season: 6/10, an average campaign for the Basques, a pretty good Tour overall, although they could have used a stage win, and a very good final week of the Vuelta.
Expectations: A top-5 in the Tour for Zubeldia and a podium finish in a Grand Tour outside of Spain for Sanchez; miscellaneous mountain stages.

Francaise des Jeux (FdJeux)
French
Sponsor: The French National Lottery
Team Manager: Marc Madiot
Key Riders: Sandy Casar, who won their only ProTour race of the season, Stage 18 of the Tour de France; Phillipe Gilbert, winner of the 2006 Omloop Het Volk; Sebastian Chavanel, who placed highly in several Tour sprints last year.
Depth: 2/10, they lost their best young rider, Thomas Lovkvist, to Team High Road and have no one capable of winning any serious stage races.
2007 Season: 4/10, but only because winning a Tour stage for a French team is HUGE. Otherwise they were very mediocre.
Expectations: Very low. A Tour stage win if they're lucky, and Milram & Quick.step have pity on them.

Gerolsteiner
German
Sponsor: German mineral water company
Team Manager: Reimund Dietzen
Key Riders: Davide Rebellin, the best rider in the Ardennes classics over the last three years, with four wins, a second place, and a third, also 2nd in Paris-Nice; Stefan Schumacher, two stages in the '06 Giro, the 2007 Amstel Gold Race, and bronze in the World Championships
Depth: 6/10, a very diverse team with a lot of very strong classics riders and time triallists.
2007 Season: 6/10, seven ProTour wins, including Amstel Gold and Fleche Wallone, as well as stages in the Giro, Dauphine, and Tour of Germany.
Expecatations: A strong showing in the Ardennes classics again, and some wins from their sprinters, especially Heinrich Haussler.

That's Part 2. Part 3 will be along soon, with Team High Road (formerly T-Mobile), Lampre, Liquigas, Milram, and Quick.Step.