The Briton required bandaging to his right arm after falling on the first of the day's two categorised climbs, bringing back bad memories of his travails in last month's Tour de France as he was forced to abandon his title defence due to injury.

But he recovered to mount a late charge to the line of the 169 kilometres stage and surprised his main rivals to finish seventh ahead of race leader Alejandre Valverde and compatriot Alberto Contador.

Valverde remains 15 seconds clear of Movistar team mate Nairo Quintana of Colombia, with Tinkoff-Saxo's Contador 18 seconds off the pace.

But the Spaniard now has Froome breathing down his neck just one second behind.

Chris Froome recovered from a crash to claw back three seconds on the leaders during today's stage ©Getty Images



Meanwhile, at the business end of today's trek from Alhendin, Cannondale rider De Marchi was hugely impressive as he crossed the line 1min 35sec ahead of the rest of the field.

The Italian was part of a four-man break that included Canada's Ryder Hesjedal, Swiss Johann Tschopp and Frenchman Hubert Dupont, who led the charge after 40km of riding.

The quartet dovetailed well and looked set to go all the way to the line before the first to drop back was Ag2r-La Mondiale rider Dupont with 15km to go.

Garmin-Sharp's Hesjedal then hit the deck negotiating a fast left-hand bend inside the closing kilometres, but like Froome, the Canadian demonstrated his powers of recovery by surging back to out-gun Tschopp for second place, while on a day of resurgence, Dupont summoned up his reserves to take third ahead of the man from Switzerland.

De Marchi celebrates after an impressive performance saw him cross the line on his own in Alcaudete ©AFP/Getty Images



"It's one of the best memories of my career," said a delighted De Marchi afterwards, who claimed only the second major stage win of his career following up his final day win on last year's Critérium du Dauphiné.

"It's great to have been in a break with such strong riders.

"It was a near-perfect day for me.

"Today, I felt like I had good legs and I was allowed to go for it."

The riders will tackle the longest stage of this year's Vuelta tomorrow when they leave Baeza for the 207km trip to Albacete.

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