Borut Bozic showed that Astana is much more than just Vincenzo Nibali in this year's Paris-Nice when he sprinted to a fine 4th in yesterday's third stage. The Slovenian praised the teamwork that both laid the foundations for his result and for the fact that Nibali has reached the hilly stages without suffering any major time loss.

All the talk about Astana in this year's Paris-Nice may have been focused on the presence of Giro champion Vincenzo Nibali but the team are about more than their greatest star. Sprinter Borut Bozic proved his fast legs when he finished 4th in yesterday's bunch sprint in the French race.

Bozic is using the race to build for the cobbled classic and has had a steady build-up to the race. He posted two fine top 10 results in the Tour of Oman but yesterday's result was taken at WorldTour level and by far the best of the young season.

Throughout the stage, Astana was prominent on the front of the peloton, with Lieuwe Westra, Valerio Agnoli, and Alessandro Vanotti protecting their captains from the wind. Bozic was full of praise for the teamwork.

“I’m really happy with the team, not just the result," he said. "Astana rode the last 40k at the front – Vanotti, Westra and Agnoli were in the wind to protect Nibali for the classification.I did maybe my first really good sprint of the year because of them."

The team will now change its focus to the GC where Nibali is not the only Astana card as Francesco Gavazzi and Enrico Gasparotto could also excel on this course.

You can read our preview of today's stage here and follow our live coverage at 14.25 CET on CyclingQuotes.com/live.