Cycling: Cancellara beaten as Goss claims Milan-San Remo

(EPA)

Australian Matthew Goss recorded the biggest win of his career with victory at the head of an eight-rider group in the Milan-San Remo race on Saturday.

The HTC-Highroad rider proved too strong for the winner of the 2008 race, world time trial champion Fabian Cancellara, who finished second with Philippe Gilbert in third.

Goss continued his impressive run of form, which has seen him finish second overall in the Tour Down Under and also take stage wins in the Tour of Oman and Paris-Nice.

The eight-rider group had pulled clear with about two kilometres remaining as Cancellara led the charge to reel in BMC's Greg Van Avermaet. The first rider to break on the home straight was Lampre's Michele Scarponi but nobody could live with the finishing pace of Goss.

With 300m of the race remaining Scarponi made his move but Goss timed his sprint right to beat Cancellara and Gilbert.

"After that sort of distance you're never sure of how strong you'll be in a sprint but I knew I had a good chance," Goss said. "I saw Fabian was coming up and I made sure I got to the line ahead of him."

The chances of Mark Cavendish (HTC-Highroad) disappeared about 15km from the end as the group he was in was cast adrift from the leaders.

Goss, a professional since 2007 and a resident of nearby Monaco, had earned his biggest previous wins in a stage of the Paris-Nice earlier this season, a stage of last year's Giro d'Italia and the Paris-Brussels Classic in 2009.