Astarloza 2.0

Remember this fellow? If you do, you probably either love him or loathe him. If you don't, you better get familiar with him, 'cause Mikel Astarloza is indeed making a comeback. The Tour de France stage winner of 2009 (not anymore though), will, according to team head Igor González de Galdeano, either return when his suspension's up in June or for the 2012 season at the latest. As we know all too well, the Gipuzkoan was caught red-handed after his Tour heroics, testing positive for EPO. He never came clean though and insists to this date that he's innocent. Exactly how his tests came up positive he never really had an explanation for, but in his homeland no one really gave a shit and he's still a hero to this day. "Mikel is dear to the Gipuzkoan people and our fans in the Basque country. And he's a good rider. Now we want his to come back to our team", Galdeano told Bilbao daily El Correo yesterday. "I was in touch with him a couple of months ago, but since our roster was pretty much finalized back then I didn't really give it much thought. But since then we've had a lot of problems with crashes and injuries. We're thinking about welcoming him back in (this season), and certainly he'll be with us in 2012 at the latest. He was important for us in the past and he'll be so again". I'm glad Galdeano said he's dear to the team's fans in the Basque country and not to the team's fans in general, because, frankly speaking, I don't think he is. If he had come clean back when he was caught I would have been more at ease with it, but I'm everything but right now. Galdeano, hiring disgraced ex-dopers is not the way forward. Yeah, sure, Vino's back, Basso's back, Valverde will be back etc, but no one really take them seriously, and their comebacks have reflected badly on their teams ever since. He's in his right to sign him up of course. Astarloza has done his time and is free to race, full stop. But it's the credibility of the team that's at stake. It's not really a surprise he'll return to racing, I heard it from several sources already last summer, but it's nonetheless a controversial move that's sure to provoke heated debate among Euskaltel and cycling fans alike. A debate that's not going to do Euskaltel any favours I'm afraid.