Lance Armstrong: Mark Cavendish frustrated by deceit in cycling

Mark Cavendish says Lance Armstrong and other drug cheats should confess to doping in order to prevent further damage to cycling's tarnished image.

Cavendish described revelations about Armstrong as "frustrating" but insists cycling is one of the cleanest sports.

"If you've done something, confess," he said. "That anyone can damage the sport I love right now, it's frustrating."

Armstrong has been stripped of his seven Tour de France titles and banned for life for doping offences.

A United States Anti-Doping Agency report called the American a "serial" cheat who led "the most sophisticated, professionalised and successful doping programme that sport has ever seen".

Despite evidence of widespread systematic doping in the past, Cavendish maintains that cycling only appears to have more dopers because the testing is much more stringent than in other sports and insisted there are cheats in "every walk of life".

He told BBC Sport's Matt Slater: "There are cheats in entertainment, journalists cheat, every single sport has cheats.

"If you put the effort into catching them and you have a structure that does things properly, you're going to catch a cheat.

"It doesn't happen in other sports, not because they are clean but because it's not got the structure cycling has. In my eyes, cycling is the cleanest sport."

Cavendish said he respected those such as Great Britain team-mate David Millar who have openly discussed their doping and therefore played a part in trying to clean up the sport.

"I've worked with David Millar," said Cavendish. "This guy's remorseful. He's repented."

He also praised others, including former HTC director Rolf Aldag.

"These guys care about the sport," he said. "They ruin their reputation to move the sport on, but other people care more about themselves."

In his candid interview with BBC Sport, Cavendish also said he felt let down by Team Sky, arguing he was misled by the British-based team into believing they would compete for the green jersey - awarded to the rider with the most points, usually won by sprinters - in tours.

The Manx sprinter, 27, said he joined Team Sky in 2011 believing he would be able to battle it out for the green jersey in the Tour de France points competition but ended up taking a back seat as team-mate Bradley Wiggins secured overall victory and the yellow jersey.

"I wouldn't have gone to Sky in the first place if they had said you're not going to win the green next year," said Cavendish.

"If I wanted to go just for green, I wouldn't have gone to Sky anyway, but we had this idea of yellow and green and that it was two British riders on a British team backed by British sponsors.

"That was a big thing for me. I'm a patriotic lad."

Cavendish said Sky's decision not to go for green "kind of threw what my whole career is about into turmoil" but said he would not rule out a return to the Dave Brailsford-led team in the future.

"The best thing I did was go," added the 2011 world road race champion, who will ride for Omega Pharma-QuickStep in 2013.

"I wanted to stay friends. I wouldn't rule out ever going back but that's up to them. I had a wicked time and was part of history."