T-Mobile announce decision on future tomorrow

iainf72

I wonder how it will go. I really do wonder if they have a future to be honest.

Cons

- Telekom have looked at all their sports sponsorship this year after all the strikes by their workers this year. €14m per years isn't a huge amount but it's not small either

- A positive from a highly paid German on the team. I think if the + came from Hans Auslander it would've been easier to deal with than if it came from Sinkewitz.

- TV coverage being canned in Germany during the Tour

- The fact that Telekom sponsored team were amongst the biggest needle junkies until 2006 but this has only emerged this year

- And the new super clean team managed to employed a DS who only fessed up this year when left with no choice and managed to employ doctors who were responsible for dishing out gear in the 90s

Pros

- Tour of Germany is on TV (and I think they sponsor it too?)

- Some reasonable results (although, do the general public think they're credible is the bigger question)

???

Don't know - I'd be tempted to cut the ProTour team, keep the womans team?

Ste_S

Pro - Seen as a driving force in trying to clean up cycling. Would withdrawl now be seen as failure ?
Pro - Linus' day in yellow

I'd love them to stay, but it's not looking good

iainf72

Oh, forgot a con

Con - Team management given information about Sinkewitz in May but didn't appear to do anything about it

Stark.

I really hope they stay involved. It seems non-sensical to support the team in its stance against doping and then pull the plug.

But in the end, it'll be a hard-nosed business decision. Apparently viewing figures are still high for the sport across Europe, but with the German TV channels getting twitchy about broadcasting events mired in doping scandals that might push T-Mobile to back out.

schlepcycling

Does the old saying 'there's no such thing as bad publicity' apply?. As for the Tour coverage being pulled in Germany, T-Mobile is a worldwide company and maybe the German market although important isn't where the they are going to grow their business, they need to be in the 'emerging' markets and with cycling being the travelling media circus it is I'd still bet it's cheaper for them to sponsor the team than to have to pay for advertising campaigns in all the same markets that the team reaches.

It's a different matter for the likes of Cofidis which is locked into just the French market and if their image is damaged in their home market there's nowhere really for them to go.

timoid.

If I was in charge of T-Mobile's decision, I'd pull the plug on the men's team and then form a T-Mobile development squad at the continental level sponsoring young kids to get into cycling sans dope. A sort of ethical academy.

The current outfit is still rotten and and a new lick of magenta paint won't change that.

andyp

I hope they stay as the benefits to the sport are immense if they do, i.e. a major corporation pushing hard for a sport to clean itself up.

I am, however, mindful that the tide of public opinion in Germany has turned against cycling so it wouldn't surprise me if T-Mobile's decision reflects this.

LangerDan

Press conference hasn't happened yet but according to Velonews, T-Mobile are staying - in some form-

The owner of Germany's Deutsche Telekom, Rene Obermann, announced Thursday morning that a "reasonable solution" had been found to ensure the continued operation of the T-Mobile cycling team.

Obermann, however, declined to reveal further details, pending a press conference scheduled for later in the day.

"After the unfortunate events at the Tour de France, it was not easy to make a decision," Obermann said, referring to the doping problems that emerged from this year's Tour.

Obermann said that he had discussed the team's future with both team management and German television executives.

"We arrived at a reasonable solution, but I cannot say some more before the team's press conference this afternoon," he said during his own press conference called to discuss the company's second quarter earnings report.