New Swiss kids on the block, IAM Cycling, suffered a major setback on Saturday when it was ignored for a wildcard invitation for the Tour de France, with the three available slots going to French teams Europcar, Cofidis and Sojasun.

“We are disappointed not to be selected for the Tour de France, mainly because we have the talent and resources,” general manager Serge Beucherie said. “Even though we have not won a great deal, we are on a sporting level to compete at the Tour.”

Earlier this season IAM Cycling secured wildcard invitations to the Spring Classics and also received places at Paris-Nice, the Tour de Romandie and the Tour de Suisse.

Even though these invitations and some aggressive performances this spring might have given the team a certain amount of optimism regarding a place at the Tour de France, IAM Cycling has won just two races this season – the Tour Méditerranéen through Thomas Lofkvist and stage 1 of the Circuit de la Sarthe with Matteo Pelucchi.

At the end of the day, ASO decided to stick to its recent policy of granting its wildcards to French squads and IAM Cycling missed out. All eleven Tour de France wildcards handed out in the last three years have gone exclusively to French teams.

“We of course understand the dilemma the organizers face. They receive endless requests but have only a limited number of spaces,” IAM founder Michel Thétaz said. “We respect their decision and will redouble our efforts to be included in the line-up in the coming seasons."

One way of securing an automatic berth at the 2014 Tour de France is for IAM to be active in the transfer market in order to move up to WorldTour status and thus guarantee automatic entry into the French Grand Tour. Earlier in the week, Thétaz told Swiss newspaper “Tages Anzeiger” that his team would be interested in securing the services of Fabian Cancellara for next season but acknowledged that it might prove impossible to lure him from his current RadioShack-Leopard team when his contract runs out at the end of the year.