Brailsford eyes 2014 Wiggins/Froome dream team

The pair, who between them have now won the last two editions of the race, both have claims on being the lead rider at Team Sky.

There are rumours of tensions between the two, something Brailsford played down when asked if they could appear together on the same team again.

“They can definitely ride together again,” he said.

After Froome served as a domestique in Wiggins' successful 2012 Tour, they were split in 2013 so Wiggins could focus on the Giro d'Italia and Froome could concentrate on France.

Wiggins' Giro campaign was derailed by an injury and it subsequently ruled him out of riding the Tour de France as planned. Froome managed to win the 100th edition of the race without him.

The 101th Tour begins in Yorkshire, and Brailsford says he wants both men to ride in next year's event.

“On a personal level, I’d love to see them do the Tour together next year because they’re such great talents," Brailsford added. "If we said we’ll just try to win the Tour de France next year and put in the nine absolute tip-top guys, that’d be a strong team. So maybe we will do that.

“I’m not interested in [their personal relationship]. Everyone goes on about ‘can they be friends?’ but I don’t spend a nano-second worrying about whether they get on or not.

“People talk about having team unity and team harmony. In my experience, I don’t buy that at all. Most of the best teams I’ve been with, they’re not harmonious environments.

“This is not a harmonious environment. This is a gritty environment where people are pushing really hard. Same with the Olympic team. There are agitators, and it’s a hard environment to spend a month in.

“But what you do need is goal harmony. And there’s a big difference between the two. You can have the best friends, the closest knit group, but if they’re not 100 per cent aligned behind the goal, it’s not going to work.

“Likewise, it doesn’t matter if there’s agitation amongst the group as long as when there’s a goal there, everybody aligns behind that goal and does absolutely what’s expected of them to achieve it.”