Dan Martin and Nicolas Roche crash out of Liège-Bastogne-Liège

Leaders of their respective teams in Sunday's Liège-Bastogne-Liège, Dan Martin (Cannondale-Garmin) and Nicolas Roche (Sky) had races to forget thanks to a large crash which brought both down inside the final hour of the Classic event.

Martin won the race in 2013 but crashed on the final corner last year while looking like the likely winner. Bad luck struck again in the most recent edition, with a mass pileup in the group of race favourites bringing himself, first cousin Roche and a cluster of others to the ground with 42 kilometres remaining.

Both had been in contention up until that point and would likely have challenged in the hilly finale. Instead, each were down and disorientated for some time, and while they tried to get going again would ultimately both withdraw.

Martin had already suffered a frustrating fall in Wednesday’s Flèche Wallonne Classic and had hoped for better fortunes in the last of the three Ardennes Classics.

That didn’t play out as planned and once again he found himself on the deck.

The 28 year old has had a run of misfortunes in recent seasons. He crashed out of the 2013 Vuelta a España, suffering concussion, and had that fall in the finale of Liège last year.

A fortnight later he clattered to the ground in the opening team time trial of the Giro d’Italia in Belfast, being forced to withdraw from what was one of his top season targets due to a broken collarbone.

He bounced back to win the Il Lombardia Classic last October, but falling twice in five days during the Ardennes races will test his patience once again.

Roche too will be vexed by the loss of his chances. His move to Team Sky means that he will spend much of the year riding for others such as 2013 Tour winner Chris Froome and Richie Porte, but he was given a green light to lead the team on Sunday.

The opportunity was lost in the seconds it took for him to become tangled in the pileup.

“Nico would definitely have been there at the end if he hadn’t crashed,” said Team Sky’s directeur sportif Gabrial Rasch. “He’s fine actually - he went down pretty hard but thankfully was more dazed than injured.

“Once that had worn off he was OK, and that’s a big relief because we’d feared the worst when we saw him lying on the ground. He took a bang to the head and also to his shoulder, but nothing’s broken. As always, we’ll keep an eye on him but there’s no long-term worries.”

Roche later confirmed that while he was stiff, he would be able to compete in the upcoming Tour de Romandie as planned.

The race was won by the 2006 and 2008 champion Alejandro Valverde, who was quickest in a ten man sprint to the line. The Movistar rider had earlier highlighted his strong form with second in last Sunday's Amstel Gold Race plus victory in Wednesday's Flèche Wallonne.

He was one of the strongest in the finale, riding prominently after a dangerous three man move comprising

Roman Kreuziger (Tinkoff Saxo), Katusha's Gianpaolo Caruso and Astana rider Jakob Fuglsang were hauled back with six kilometres remaining.

A number of other attacks were fired off, the most serious being a final kilometre uphill move by the Spaniard Dani Moreno (Katusha), but Valverde reeled this in and then won the sprint to the line.

“These last few years, I’ve gained in strength and confidence,” said Valverde after his triumph. “When you’re calm and confident, it makes things easier. I think my win is also due to that.

“Moreno’s attack was tough. After a fast and long race it was difficult to react but I knew he would struggle. Everyone was expecting me to go for it as the race favourite. I wanted to keep energy but I had to go for it. I managed to catch him and kept enough strength for the final sprint.”

The 35 year old is a controversial winner, having served a two-year doping ban earlier in his career.