This afternoon Danish Continental team Christina Watches will present a package of three new riders, two new sports directors and a new sponsor, all from Italy. The team would have liked to present a fourth rider – but he is now suspended for doping.

The team had been in close talks with the 31-year old Italian, but would only sign him if he was acquitted in his ongoing doping case for evading a post-race control in February last year.

Yesterday Reda's case was heard at the Italian Olympic Committee, CONI, and the rider was sentenced to a two-year suspension, starting 21st June 2013 and ending 20th June 2015.

Yesterday Christina Watches confirmed interest to our sister site Feltet.dk: “We are very interested in signing him,” said sports director Bo Hamburger. „But we wait and see how the case is settled.“ Hamburger added: “It is a completely silly case.“

A strange case

Francesco Reda was flying in the spring of 2013: Within a month he stood on the podium of the Tour Méditerranéen and the Trofeo Laigueglia, and reached the top ten in the GP Città di Camaiore and Strade Bianche.

At one of these races, the GP Città di Camaiore, Reda was accused to have run from a doping control. When this became known in June, his team Androni Giocattoli-Venezuela suspended him, but were later ordered by the UCI to let the rider race again.

In December CONI recommended a two-year suspension. Back then, Reda claimed his innocence, but now the verdict has been passed in this long and strange doping case.

Nevertheless, Christina Watches will still present three new riders later today. You can see the names on this site at 2 o'clock pm.