Boss fights to save job in athletics meltdown

BRITISH athletics has been sent into meltdown by an astonishing attempt to remove UKA chairman Richard Bowker from power.

Sportsmail understands that little more than 24 hours after Niels de Vos stepped down as chief executive on Friday, a letter was sent by the UKA members council to the board calling for Bowker’s brief tenure to be terminated.

Driven by representatives of the four home nations, the members council have threatened to invoke their own powers if the board fail to take action by 5pm today.

At the heart of the problem is the attempt by Bowker, who also serves as an independent director of the English Football League, to streamline UK Athletics by making the home nations subservient to UKA. In particular he wants UKA to absorb England Athletics.

Bowker apparently tried to calm the situation in discussions with England Athletics chair Myra Nimmo last week, but those peace talks seem to have failed.

Insiders at UKA insisted yesterday that Bowker will refuse to stand down. A meeting between board members and key figures on the members council has been scheduled today in a bid to resolve the situation, as well as a separate UKA board meeting this afternoon.

If Bowker (right) fails to survive the crisis after little more than a year in charge it would leave Britain’s biggest Olympic sport rudderless at a challenging time. UKA are braced for the publication of their latest accounts, which could make difficult reading given the failure of the Athletics World Cup in London in July — an event masterminded by De Vos and Bowker — and a shortage of sponsorship revenue. Many considered the timing of De Vos’s departure after more than 10 years in charge to be linked to the publication of the accounts.

Board and council members have declined to comment and Bowker was unavailable for comment yesterday.

But UKA said in a statement: ‘Over the past 12 months UK Athletics has been actively seeking to devise and agree a new long-term vision and strategy for athletics at all levels in the UK.

‘Core to the vision is the desire to ensure the maximum resource gets to the grassroots areas. ‘The creation of new income sources and getting the best return from our commercial assets is critical, but so is reducing the burden of central administrative costs to the minimum necessary to deliver an effective service. ‘UKA remains committed to that principle, and to working with key stakeholders and partners

to deliver it.’