Landa finished third at the Giro d’Italia in 2015, and may have finished higher were it not for his commitments to Fabio Aru, who finished second.

It prompted a move to Team Sky that winter, having won stages at both the Giro and then the Vuelta a Espana, but, after winning the Giro del Trentino, he abandoned the 2016 Giro d’Italia through illness.

This time out, he was to co-lead the team with Geraint Thomas, but when both crashed on Blockhaus on stage nine, his GC ambitions were hit.

Nevertheless, Landa recovered well to win a stage and claim the King of the Mountains jersey, before continuing his form at the Tour de France.

When Thomas was forced to abandon the Tour too, Landa became Froome’s number two, and his form in the mountains was such that he only narrowly missed the overall podium himself – something he would undoubtedly have achieved were it not for team orders earlier in the race.

Veteran Spaniard Alejandro Valverde, 37, currently recovering from the fractured kneecap he suffered on stage one of this year’s Tour, is also contracted until 2019.

But Quintana’s agent has denied the rumours the 2014 Giro d’Italia and 2016 Vuelta a Espana will leave Movistar this winter.

Landa, meanwhile, is Movistar’s third transfer confirmed in the current transfer window, with Eduardo Sepulveda (Fortuneo-Oscaro) and Jaime Roson (Caja Rural-Seguros) both stepping up to the UCI WorldTour next year.

The future of British rider Alex Dowsett, whose contract with the Spanish team ends this year, is yet to be confirmed.