La Gazzetta dello Sport have published a list of 38 riders that have been linked to doctor Michele Ferrari in the Padova inquiry. Furthermore, the Italian newspaper indicates that there may have been systematic doping in the Astana team, with 17 team riders having used Ferrari's services.

It was about doping but not only doping. According to the investigators in the Padova inquiry, there was a real criminal system around the infamous doctor. La Gazzetta dello Sport has taken stock of the situation of the investigations which started four years ago and have been looking into the Ferrara doctor. According to the Italina newspaper the key figure is Danilo Di Luca whose testimony of December 14, 2009 after he had tested positive for CERA launched the investigation, helped bring down Lance Armstrong and may now put the Astana team in serious troubles.

After the confessions of "the Killer", whose deposition is called "the most precious ever received by a magistrate", the investigators started to seize material and create a list of names involved in the case. The central figure in the network was Michele Ferrari but he was supported by Raimondo Scimone (prosecutor), Edoardo Conceprio (bank official in Switzerland), Rocco Taminelli (legal counsel) and Giuseppe Banfi (scientific advisor) with whom he communicated through "foreign telephone cards", "encrypted Voip systems" and "users registered as third parties." In addition to doping, the network was involved in fraud and tax evasion and had links to both amateur and professional cycling and other sports like biathlon.

In view of the 90 names which were initially mentioned, Gazzetta dello Sport is now providing a list of 38 riders but makes it clear that the number of mentioned names is almost double that figure, meaning that only around 15 names come from other sports. Among the names which are said to have been in contact in 2010-2011, many already known, like Filippo Pozzato , Michele Scarponi and Giovanni Visconti , who have already served a three-month ban for consulting the doctor, but they could now face new, tougher sanctions. Gazzetta have published damning evidence, including dialogues between Visconti and Scarponit and Ferraru.

Other riders include Leonardo Bertagnoli , Daniele Pietropolli , Paralympic RIDE Fabrizio Macchi but also new names, like Marco Marcato and Alessandro Proni plus young riders like Simone Boifava , Ricardo Pichetta and Andrea Vaccher . Among the big foreign stars are Roman Kreuziger who cut his connection to Ferrari in 2010, claiming to be worried about the rumours, Alexander Kolobnev, Denis Menchov and, as has long been known, Alexander Vinokourov.

The situation for Vinokourov and Astana could become complicated as the current Astana manager is closely linked to the Ferrari history. According to La Gazzetta, almost of the Kazakh team (17 riders) are followed by Ferrari and his son Stefano. Among those, Scarponi is the only Italian, meaning that Tour de France champion Vincenzo Nibali is not reported to have been in contact with the infamous doctor.

The UCI License Commission is expected to make a decision about Astana's WorldTour license today.

The 38 NAMES 

Leonardo Bertagnolli, Simone Boifava, Diego Caccia, Enrico Franzoi, Marco Frapporti, Omar Lombardi, Fabrizio Macchi, Marco Marcato, Andrea Masciarelli, Francesco Masciarelli, Simone Masciarelli, Daniele Pietropolli, Morris Possoni, Filippo Pozzato, Alessandro Proni, Michele Scarponi, Francesco Tizza, Giovanni Visconti, Ricardo Pichetta, Andrea Vaccher, Mauricio Ardila, Volodymyr Bileka, Borut Bozic, Maxim Gourov, Vladimir Gusev, Valentin Iglinskiy, Sergei Ivanov, Vladimir Karpets, Aleksander Kolobnev, Dimitri Kozontchuk, Roman Kreuziger, Denis Menchov, Evgeni Petrov, Yaroslav Popovych, José Joaquin Rojas, Ivan Rovny, Egor Silin, Alexandre Vinokourov