World Cup can be ‘magic bullet’ for athletics’ woes
Eight-nation team event set for London in July Lord Coe promises an ‘exhilarating experience’
The new World Cup was hailed as “a magic bullet” for athletics following its launch yesterday.
As exclusively revealed by The Sunday Telegraph, British Athletics announced the creation of an eightnation competition, the inaugural edition of which will be held at the London Stadium this summer.
Scheduled for the weekend of the football World Cup final and Wimbledon finals, on the evenings of July 14 and 15, it will be contested by Great Britain, the United States, Jamaica, China, Germany, France, South Africa and Poland.
Those were the top eight nations at the World Championships in London last year in events other than long-distance races, which will not feature at the World Cup due to time constraints.
Each country will enter one male and one female athlete into every remaining track-and-field discipline and will compete for a $2million (£1.42million) prize pot, as well as the title of World Cup winners.
The president of the International Association of Athletics Federations, Lord Coe, promised the event would be a “fast-paced and exhilarating experience”.
UK Athletics chief executive Niels de Vos told The Telegraph the event was “probably a magic bullet” for the sport, billing it as
“all the best bits of the World Championships rolled into two sessions”. He added: “We looked at it and said, ‘Actually, this is a really cool idea. The sport doesn’t have a World Cup: why not? Every other sport has one; athletics should have one’.”
De Vos said the top three in each event would receive a medal and that points would be awarded for each competing country from eight down to one, with the top three nations overall receiving team medals and the winner the World Cup trophy.
Sprinter Dina Asher-smith is a candidate to lead the British team as all nations will select a female team captain to mark 100 years since British women were given the right to vote.
The World Cup evolved out of the Ryder Cup-style competition between Britain and America announced shortly after London 2017, called “The Meet”, which will not take place this year.