Serbia, Panama, Italy, Japan, China, Netherlands and France: it's not a round-the-world project, but rather an ideal journey towards the future. The road to wildcards for the 2027 season passes through the races scheduled in these countries over the next three days, the road that opens or closes doors, everything depends on the results and points scored by the teams in contention.

In contention for what? Naturally for a place within the top 30 of the world team ranking. The situation, at the moment when the International Cycling Union released its latest update on Tuesday, October 13, 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.

Not counted, obviously, are the stage races that started on Tuesday, the Tour of Guangxi and the Eneco Tour, nor the Giro del Veneto from yesterday. Missing from the tally are therefore the 80 points won in China by Team Picnic PostNL thanks to Biesterbos, the 80 for MBH at the Giro del Veneto thanks to Fancellu and the 20 for Bardiani also in Veneto thanks to Filippo Turconi.

At stake in Serbia are 40 points for the race winner, then 30, 25, 20, 15, 10, 5, 3, 1 and 1 down to 10th place and the same will apply for the two Panamanian races, one road race and one two-stage race. 7, 3 and 1 points are awarded to the top three of each stage.

At stake at the Tour of Guangxi, a WorldTour race, 50, 20 and 8 points for the stages, from 400 points for the winner down to 2 for 60th place in the general classification, but this race only concerns Picnic.

Veneto Classic and Japan Cup are 1.PS category races and therefore award 200 points to the winner, 150 to second, 125 to third, 100 to fourth, 85 to fifth, 70 to sixth, 60 to seventh, 50 to eighth, 40 to ninth, 35 to tenth, 30 to eleventh, 25 to twelfth, 20 to thirteenth, 15 to fourteenth and 10 to fifteenth.

Finally on Sunday the Chrono des Nations takes place, a 1.1 category race with points ranging from 125 for the winner to 5 for the fifteenth-placed rider. The same points are at stake for the final classification of the Eneco Tour (2.1 category) where 14, 5 and 3 points are awarded to the top three finishers in each stage.

Obviously, but this is stating the obvious, the situation is more complex for those who need to chase and make up ground, in this case Bardiani, while the Picnic situation is, if you will, separate from this battle and will concern the future of the team itself, called to pass through the scrutiny of ethical evaluations (especially in light of what dramatically emerged today) and economic assessments by the Licensing Commission.

This is a problem that does not concern the other contenders for 30th place, because in case of a team closure (for example TotalEnergies or Equipo Kern Pharma, both absolutely at risk) there will be no automatic advancement for anyone. And whoever finishes in thirty-first place will inevitably be out of the running for 2027 wildcards.