Four teams in just eighty-five points: this is the narrow margin in which, six days before the end of the 2026 season, the four teams fighting to secure a place in the UCI team ranking top 30 of this year are gathered: Bardiani CSF 7 Saber, MBH Bank CSB Telecom Fort, Team Picnic PostNL and Euskaltel-Euskadi.
This placement, it is worth remembering, as established by article 2.1.007 bis of the current UCI road racing regulations ("Starting from the 2026 season, only the 30 best-ranked teams in the UCI world team ranking of the previous season will be entitled to receive a "wild card" invitation from a Grand Tour organizer"), determines eligibility for invitations to the Giro d'Italia, Tour de France and Vuelta a España 2027, an opportunity that none of the teams involved in the fight to finish the season among the top thirty teams in the world wants to give up.
The situation, at the moment when the International Cycling Union released its latest update regarding the team standings, sees MBH Bank CSB Telecom Fort in 28th place with 2729 points, Euskaltel-Euskadi in 29th place with 2693.2 points, Team Picnic PostNL in 30th place with 2680 points and Bardiani CSF 7 Saber in 31st place with 2644.1 points.
The most precarious position currently is that of the Italian team of Bruno and Roberto Reverberi which, in recent weeks, has seen itself matched and then overtaken by both the Hungarian squad of owner Gábor Deák and the Basque team of Iñaki Isasi which, not giving up and carefully studying an alternative calendar that proved to be winning, completed a comeback five days ago that, for much of the year, seemed impossible.
Bardiani will therefore be called upon to approach the final six days of racing from a position of disadvantage that will force them to maximize participation with as many riders as possible in the last two races of their program, the Giro del Veneto (1.Pro) tomorrow and the Veneto Classic (1.Pro) on Sunday the 18th, where they will find themselves racing head-to-head with both MBH and Euskaltel.
The latter, unlike their Italian and Hungarian rivals, will have another opportunity to sufficiently replenish their points tally since on Sunday the 18th, in addition to their commitment in Pippo Pozzato's classic, they will also be competing in France at the Chrono des Nations, a 1.1 level race where Berasategi and company will be able to hunt for other results to consolidate their placement.
Euskaltel-Euskadi, MBH and Bardiani, however, would have decided, according at least to what was gathered by Jan-Pieter De Vlieger of the Nieuwsblad in an interview with Axel van der Tuuk, to add other races to their respective programs without, however, giving any indication of their participation, a choice clearly made to surprise their direct rivals and avoid finding themselves competing with them on the same roads.
In particular, based on what was revealed by the Polish-born but Dutch-origin rider, the Hungarian team and the Italian one would be moving in great secrecy towards the Tour of Serbia (a 2.2 race scheduled from Thursday the 15th to Sunday the 18th of October), while the Basque team has opted to head to Panama where one after another the Gran Prix Chiriquí (a 1.2 race) on Thursday the 15th and the Clásica Provincia de Chiriquí (a 2.2 race) between Saturday the 17th and Sunday the 18th will be held.
"My team manager had asked me not to tell anyone that we would go to Panama because otherwise other teams could also decide to follow us, but at this moment we're already on the plane so now I can talk about it" confessed van der Tuuk before giving a more precise picture of what happened in recent hours.
"The Solution Tech NIPPO Rali, 26th in the standings, has a connection with local organizers through their sponsor Rali (the brand is from Latin America, ed.) and they made sure we could participate, while MBH and Bardiani couldn't. Solution Tech doesn't want these teams to be their competitors for Giro wild cards, but apparently Bardiani and MBH will now race in Serbia" explained the native of Assen, thus revealing the apparent involvement of Solution Tech in these last-minute moves made by the various teams fighting for a place in the top 30.
Also fully involved in the fight for the top 30 of the 2026 UCI team ranking is Team Picnic PostNL whose situation, full of unknowns, deserves however to be explained separately. The team of Iwan Spekenbrink, in fact, is racing with an annual World Tour license whose extension for 2027 and 2028 is subject to certain financial guarantees that it is required to provide to the international governing body by year-end. In recent days, however, in the interest of accuracy, there has also been circulation of speculation regarding a possible self-demotion of Degenkolb and company to the ProTeams category, an option that was however denied by a team spokesperson to the Wielerflits portal.
Despite this, it appears quite evident that the Picnic case remains shrouded in mystery and at the moment the question regarding what type of license it will race with next season has no answer. These doubts cast a shadow of uncertainty over which and how many teams will be able to dream of a wild card for the 2027 Grand Tours, races where, regardless of the category it will be part of, the Dutch team will be able to start if it finishes in the top thirty positions of the team standings this season.
From this point of view, Picnic will search for the final crucial points by moving on fronts different from those of the three ProTeam squads mentioned above and, lining up at the start of races with very substantial stakes (a World Tour stage race like the Tour of Guangxi and a 2.1 level one like the Eneco Tour), should have on paper (rather) easy play in conquering a top 30 placement.
It is not to be ruled out, given the tight gap between the four contenders, that two or more teams could also conclude the season tied on points in the team standings.
For this specific situation the UCI regulations speak quite clearly and, with article 2.10.004 ter, establish that "in case of a tie between teams in the UCI world team ranking, the position will be determined based on the greater number of first places in the final general classification (on time) of their best 10 riders in the races taken into account for ranking purposes".
Despite a situation that remains largely to be defined, it is inevitable not to start looking at what could be the teams invited to the Grand Tours of next year, in particular, to the first of the three scheduled, namely the Giro d'Italia 2027.
In this perspective, it is appropriate to recall that, again according to article 2.1.007 bis, "for the 2026, 2027 and 2028 seasons, the assignment of wild cards must be done in such a way as to guarantee the participation of 23 teams in each Grand Tour" and that organizers are obliged to invite the three best ProTeam teams based on the previous year's UCI ranking but these have the possibility to decline the invitation "at the latest 70 days before the event".
This opportunity was taken this year at the Corsa Rosa by Cofidis which, deciding not to participate in the Italian stage race, opened the doors of the Giro to Unibet Rose Rockets of Bas Tietema, invited directly by RCS Sport thanks to the extra wild card that it found itself assigning after the withdrawal of the French representative.
This scenario, however, looking ahead to next year, will not repeat itself as, as revealed by General Manager Raphaël Jeune to Directvelo, the transalpine team (already certain to be among the top three ProTeam formations of the year along with Tudor and Pinarello Q36.5) will be in the race in Italy in 2027: "We will participate in the Giro. It is an important event for our partners like Cofidis, but also Look, Campagnolo, Vittoria or Elite, which have a presence or interests in Italy".
This will ensure that RCS will therefore be able to dispense in favor of the other ProTeams entitled to it only another two invitations, of which at least one, by regulation (the same article 2.1.007 bis says that "at least one UCI WorldTeam or UCI ProTeam team from the organizer's country must be invited among the 23 participating teams"), will have to be assigned to an Italian-based team.
In light of this provision, at the moment one between Polti VisitMalta (with 25th place as the first Italian team in the team ranking) and Solution Tech NIPPO Rali (26th and clearly the best Italian formation for number of seasonal wins with 27 victories) we can already say will certainly be at the starting line of the 110th Giro, but the discussion could extend to Bardiani if it manages to close in the top 30 of the 2026 ranking. Even with the possible exclusion of the Reverberi team, however, it appears evident that the organizers' choice will not be the simplest and most obvious one since MBH (Hungarian team but with strong Italian traction) and, why not, even the Rockets (sponsored by a substantial pool of Italian companies) have the credentials to aspire to the second and last wild card available for the next edition. In the end, aided by the mechanisms of this increasingly debated system, the feeling is that once again someone will end up having to swallow a rather bitter pill.
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