With two stage victories in Tirreno-Adriatico Sagan is the overwhelming favourite for this year's edition of Milan-Sanremo. He will be duly supported by a strong team with one sole objective: the first monument victory for their Slovak phenomenon.

Peter Sagan had probably won last year's Milan-Sanremo if team tactics had not forced him to disturb the chase of the final three-man break containing then-teammate Vincenzo Nibali. The young Slovak ended up winning the sprint for fourth and left the Mediterranean coast wondering what might have been.

Such scenario should not play out again this year. With Nibali now at Astana, the team will enter La Primavera solely focused on the Slovakian champion, and he looks to be surrounded by a solid crew of teammates.

The team is an amalgamation of its squads for Tirreno-Adriatico and Paris-Nice, and the team has chosen the strongest riders from both races. From this week's race in Italy the team has chosen Moreno Moser, Damiano Caruso, Maciej Bodnar and Kristijan Koren along with Sagan, and they will be joined by Elia Viviani, Paolo Longo Borghini and Alessandro De Marchi.

With Sagan the superior climber among the sprinters Cannondale is expected to set a furious tempo all the way from the climb of Le Manie to wear out the fastest riders. Expect to see the likes of Bodnar, Koren, Longo Borghini and De Marchi hit the front and control the peloton for the majority of the race's final part.

Caruso and Moser should be able to follow any kind of attacks on the Cipressa and contribute to the tempo-setting on the climbs while it will be up to Sagan himself to stay with the leaders on the Poggio. Young Viviani showed in Paris-Nice that he approaches his peak condition, but will mainly use this year's race as a learning experience before harboring personal ambitions for Gent-Wevelgem.

“We chose the riders with the best form,” sport director Mario Scirea explained. “And also chose those more suited to certain roles during the race. Of course we know that a rider like Sagan allows us to aim for top results, but our contenders have the same thought. Lots of attention will be focused on us: first of all, we have to be united as a team. Sanremo is a hard and really tactical race. We have to be ready to face many variables and be able to manage them. In other words, it will be an exciting and really hard challenge.”

Milan-Sanremo will take place on Sunday. You can follow Sagan's attempt to finally win a monument live on CyclingQuotes.com/live.