Geraint Thomas fights to stay in touch after Tour de France crash amid carnage on cobbles

Geraint Thomas hit the deck on a day of Tour de France carnage on the cobbles – but just about kept his dream of a second Yellow Jersey alive.

Toppled in the crash which forced Australian Jack Haig to retire hurt and quit the race, Thomas and fellow Brit Adam Yates fought hard to limit their losses. But Primoz Roglic, runner-up in 2020 and one of the favourites, dislocated his right shoulder in another crash – and although the Slovenian managed to put it back in its socket in amazing DIY repairs by the roadside, he lost two minutes in the general classification.

Roglic, who came a cropper because of stray bale of hay on a roundabout, revealed: "I couldn't put it immediately back in on the road so I had to sit in the chair of a spectator. I have a technique to put it back in."

Defending champion Tadej Pogacar, who escaped all the prangs, will be hard to catch now after stealing another 13sec on his main GC rivals.

Thomas, the 2018 champion, moved into the top 10 – 50sec off the lead but, ominously, 31sec behind Pogacar – was blameless in his latest snack of tarmac sandwich and otherwise negotiated 97.5 miles from Lille to Arenberg, including 12 miles of cobbles, proficiently. He emerged from the dust clouds of the pave blocks to say: “After sector six or seven of the cobbles, when I looked round I was quite surprised how many (few) of us were left.

“But about two minutes later, Jack and some of the Bahrain Victorious boys went down in front of me and I got taken out. I nearly missed it, but I had to chase back and I had no idea who was where by the end. It was a case of survival. It definitely could have been worse - but I felt like it could have been a lot better as well.”

Ineos Grenadiers road captain Luke Rowe added: