Poms put up white flag

English athletes warned not to stir up Aussies

SPOOKED English athletes are already running scared of Australia even before the starter’s pistol has sounded for the Commonwealth Games.

The delicate Poms have received an extraordinary teamwide directive to downplay the rivalry due to fears they will crack under the pressure.

The intense Ashes-style duel between the old foes is expected to be a highlight of the Gold Coast spectacular, with the bruised Australians out for redemption after being beaten in the medal tally for the first time in nearly three decades last time out in Glasgow in

2014.

The English are so concerned their stars will not be able to cope with the hype they have decided no team members should even publicly discuss the rivalry.

Team England official Carys Edwards said the decision “comes from the athletes themselves”, currently based in Brisbane finetuning their preparations before the Games begin next week.

“It does put a lot of pressure on the athletes, especially the sports where the rivalry is a bit bigger,” she said.

“The athletes would prefer not to talk about it.”

To escape the pressure, tense English athletes are hiding behind carefully workshopped, bland statements, insisting their fierce rivals from Down Under are just another one of 71 teams in competition.

“We are competing against 70 nations and at the end of the day Australia is one of those,” Team England’s chef de mission Sarah Winckless said.

“We are not talking about medal tables or results ... we haven’t focused on (the rivalry) at all.

“It’s a real privilege to come to Australia.”

When a News Corp reporter visited the team’s Queensland preparation camp, two athletes and one official gave yawn-inducing statements similar to that of Winckless.

“The thing is, coming to a multi-sport games, there’s 71 countries competing and obviously you just focus on the teams that are in your pool first and foremost and Australia is one of those,” basketballer Siobhan Prior said.

And three-time Commonwealth gold medallist lawn bowler Ellen Falkner insisted there was a mutual respect between the Aussies and the Poms.

“The Games are much bigger than two countries. There are 71 nations out there competing,” she said.

Preparation camp manager Francesca Kelly even claimed England don’t have a medal target in mind.