Cadel Evans' Tour de France campaign went from bad to worse on Tuesday as he tumbled down the overall standings towards what could be his lowest finish on the race.

Two days after admitting he had suffered his "worst ever day" in his five appearances so far, the Australian finished the 16th stage three minutes behind all the main yellow jersey contenders.

Evans is now over seven minutes off the pace of Spanish race leader Alberto Contador, who beat the Australian by only 23secs to win the 2007 race.

To rub salt into Evans' wounds his Belgian team Silence - with whom he has finished runner-up the past two editions - admitted they will be looking to groom teammate Jurgen Van den Broeck as a future yellow jersey contender.

In all it couldn't have been a worse day for Evans, who after arriving 3:55 behind stage winner Mikel Astarloza, and three minutes behind all his rivals, had little to say.

"I'm out of it. I'm out of the race. For a place on the podium at least," said Evans.

"Physically, everything (is) fine. But for professional reasons I can't comment on the problems I've been having."

Whether that points to any discord within his team is anybody's guess, but on Tuesday it was announced that Evans would be racing the Tour of Spain.

Earlier this season Silence announced that Evans would ride the Giro d'Italia. Evans did not want to and, digging his heels in, got to stick to a programme focused entirely on the Tour's yellow jersey.

On this year's race Evans has had to deal with a more quality-packed field, with Contador returning after his absence last year and the presence of seven-time champion Lance Armstrong giving a whole new dynamic to the race.

But despite starting well on the first stage time trial Evans' hopes have evaporated slowly since his team had a disastrous performance on the fourth stage time trial.

After losing more time to Contador on stage seven at the race's first summit in the Pyrenees, Silence had expected Evans to bounce back on Sunday's ride to Verbier, the second summit finish.

At the Swiss ski resort Evans finished 1:26 behind Contador as the Spaniard won the stage to pull on the yellow jersey ending speculation surrounding his leadership skills within Astana, also the team of Armstrong.

After Tuesday's setback, Evans was severely disheartened.

But when asked where it all went wrong, his team had few answers.

"You should ask him," team manager Hendrik Redant told AFP.

"I think he's disappointed, that's for sure. On Verbier he wasn't 100 percent and it seems also today again he couldn't really follow the best, so that's it."

Redant admitted the chance of a podium place was now well out of reach.

And he said the team may now focus on trying to hope for Evans, or Van den Broeck, to bid for a stage win.

"I think it's going to be very difficult for a podium place. We've lost another three minutes at least, so to get back those three minutes is almost unrealistic," said Redant.

"We came here primarily to help Cadel for the yellow (jersey), and we'll stick to that. But with Jurgen now proving that he's there, two, three, four days consecutively so maybe we should look to him for a stage victory."

Van den Broeck, a rarity in that he is Belgian and he can climb well in the high mountains, succeeded on Tuesday in joining another breakaway, which in theory allowed Silence not to participate in the chasing work on the second day of three in the Alps.

He went on to give himself the chance of a stage win, but was pipped in the end by Astarloza after the Euskaltel rider attacked a three-man group 2.5km from the finish.

However, Redant now believes Van den Broeck, initially brought to the Tour to help Evans in the mountains, could be the man they focus their hopes on in the future.

"He still has to grow but last year in the Giro (d'Italia) he almost got the white jersey," said Redant.

"But his performance here is confirmation that he could be a contender. This is a diamond you can keep and you have to treasure it."