Adam Yates expressed his sympathy for Julian Alaphilippe after taking the yellow jersey off him due to a costly illegal feed on stage five of the Tour de France.

Alaphilippe was given a 20-second time penalty for taking a water bottle in the final 20 kilometres of the 183 km stage from Gap to Privas, which was won by Wout van Aert on Wednesday.

Yates was on the Mitchelton-Scott team bus when he discovered he had become the new race leader, with Deceuninck-QuickStep's Alaphilippe 16 seconds adrift of the Brit after his hopes of being the first French winner of the race since 1985 took a big blow.

A surprised Yates, who has an advantage of three seconds over Primoz Roglic, would have preferred to be donning yellow in different circumstances.

The Englishman said: "I don't think any rider would want to take yellow under these circumstances, I'd prefer to take it with my legs rather than the result of a time penalty.

"I didn't even find out until I was in the bus and showered. I feel bad for him."

He added: "I wanted to try something tomorrow, but I guess I'll wear the jersey tomorrow now, continue as normal and try and win stages.

"I just asked him [Alaphilippe] what happened because I only found out two minutes ago what happened. He just told me he took a feed or a bottle in the last 20 kilometres.

"I was already on the bus for a long time, I'd already had a shower and was ready to go home. But the director came up to me and told me I had to come up here [to be presented with the yellow jersey]."