Vincenzo Nibali’s disqualification at the Vuelta a Espana follows last year’s double disqualification of Gianluca Brambilla and Ivan Rovny in the same race .

But the Etixx-QuickStep man and his Tinkoff-Saxo counterpart were sent packing for entirely different reasons, namely starting a fist fight while riding in the break on stage 16.

As they approached the penultimate climb of the day in the 13-man move, Brambilla called Rovny out for his perceived lack of effort.

The response saw jerseys grabbed, fists swung, punches landed – leading to Rovny requiring new sunglasses – and then ultimately the commissaires getting involved.

It was nearly half-an-hour later that a decision was announced, with Brambilla having attacked with two other riders off the front and Rovny having returned to the bunch to help with the chase.

Despite both riders clearly having an impact on the remainder of the stage, their race was cut short as the red commissaires’ car pulled up alongside to issue the bad news.

Brambilla called it a ‘sad day’ on Twitter, though he got some support from Rovny’s team owner Oleg Tinkov who had said it was part of the ‘SHOW’ a la hockey.