“After a perfect season it was really a big goal to win a world championship and I just can’t believe it happened.”

The success meant Pogacar became the first man to win the ‘Triple Crown’ since Ireland’s Stephen Roche in 1987, while Belgian great Eddy Merckx was the first to do it in 1974. In 2022, Annemiek van Vleuten of the Netherlands became the only woman to achieve the landmark.

Pogacar finished in six hours, 27 minutes and 30 seconds – 34 seconds clear of Australia’s Ben O’Connor, who broke off the front of the chasing pack to claim silver.

His victory replicated superb solo rides in the spring’s one-day races, when the Slovenian attacked from 30km out to win the Liege-Bastogne-Liege and from 80km to claim the Strade Bianche.

Van der Poel finished 58 seconds back in third after winning a sprint finish for bronze, pipping fourth-placed Latvian Toms Skujins, while world time-trial champion Evenepoel was fifth and Swiss rider Marc Hirschi sixth.

Scotland’s Oscar Onley, 21, was the first Briton home in a creditable 16th place.