Geraint Thomas is raring to make his return after crashing out of Paris-Nice last weekend, and believes Team Sky have a number of cards to play at Milan-San Remo on Sunday.

La Primavera marks the start of a key block of racing for Thomas, who had been building his condition steadily ahead of the Classics before a tumble on Saturday forced him to abandon ‘The Race to the Sun’.

The Welshman had enjoyed a stellar performance up to that point, taking the yellow jersey at the end of stage four and defending it for two subsequent days. At the time of his crash, Thomas was still second on the general classification and only eight seconds off the pace.

That performance was admirable given the 27 year old had only been promoted to team leader two days before the start of the race, and the man himself was pleased with how he performed.

“Coming into the race, I knew I was going OK, and being told the team were going to be riding for me gave me that added pressure to perform. I was grateful to be given that role, even though I didn’t know initially how I’d get on,” he said on Team Sky’s official website.

“I felt good during the opening three stages though, and taking the jersey and defending it for a few days was a massive boost to my confidence.”

Thomas crashed out on a fast descent less than 10km from home on the penultimate day of action, and although the injuries sustained were serious enough to end his race prematurely, they were not severe enough to derail his longer-term objectives.

“The crash was more frustrating than anything else because a week’s worth of hard work from the team was lost in less than a second. That was pretty hard to take at the time because I’d been happy with the way I’d been riding up to that point.”

“I took a chunk out of my hip which required a few stitches, but I’ve had a lot worse than that in the past, and while I was a bit stiff and sore the following day, I was back on the bike again on Monday. That allowed me to turn the legs over and help me feel better in myself. I had two easy days after that and have been building my efforts again since then.”

Thomas has been riding out of his training base in Monaco, and that proximity to San Remo means he has been able to re-familiarise himself with the roads that will host Sunday’s finale.

While he has not fully recovered him his recent tumble, Thomas doesn’t expect it to hinder him unduly and is confident he can contribute during the longest one-day race of the season.

“I can still feel my knee and my hip a little bit, so I’m definitely not 100%,” he added. “But I don’t think it’ll affect my performance too much.”

“We haven’t spoken about specific tactics yet, but without Le Manie in the race, we’re expecting it to come down to a bunch sprint so Edvald [Boasson Hagen] will probably be our strongest rider. The route suits Ben [Swift]’s style as well, so he could have a free role and give us another card to play. It’s forecast rain for Sunday so that could make things more unpredictable, so we’ll just have to see.”

“I’d love to do a strong ride myself, and Milan–San Remo marks the start of a major block of racing for me where I’ll be hoping to perform well in every race I enter.”

“I feel like I’ve got the legs to do something in the next month or so, but these races are really unpredictable and you need everything to go well for you if you’re going to be in the mix.”

This year could be one of the final times Thomas specifically targets the Classics, with more general classification chances likely to come his way after his strong performance in France.

Thomas would welcome that shift in focus and already harbours ambitions to make his mark in longer types of racing.

He concluded: “I enjoyed being the team leader last week and I’d like to become more of a GC rider in the future.

“My focus will turn towards that next year, and even though we’ve got guys like Richie [Porte], Brad [Wiggins] and Chris [Froome] in the squad, I’ll be looking to take my chances where I can.”