Speaking on his own website, Marcel Kittel has spoken of having “mixed feelings” about his Tour de France, after he won stage four, but ended the race with three less wins that he took in each of his last two Tours.

"All in all I am leaving the Tour with mixed feelings," Kittel wrote. "Of course I am happy with my stage win. It is always a good feeling to win at the Tour. But we never got in a real flow, we had to work hard for everything. Naturally, you always have to work and invest a lot. But it just didn't seem to come naturally."

However, he says with his win, Dan Martin’s ninth on GC and the good performance of Julian Alaphilippe in his debut Grand Tour, the team cans till be happy.

"As a team, we can still be satisfied," Kittel wrote. "With his ninth place, Daniel Martin got the hoped-for top-ten placing. We had a lot of podium placings, were very present in break groups and presented our sponsors well."