Purity of sport means better is expected of British athletes

MAYBE IT’S not fair on athletics that we expect better of it than other sports, but it definitely seems to be the case.

That probably has something to do with the fact that track and field is in many ways the purest sport of them all.

They run, they throw and they jump.

There’s no offside with its endless interpretations like football, no mauls and rucks that can be utterly impossible to fathom at times like rugby, and even professionals struggle with the golf rule book.

Sometimes a sprinter gets disqualified for a false start but other than that it’s about as uncomplicated as sport gets.

When people cheat at the elite level of athletics by taking drugs, we probably view it as a bigger sin than in other sports. If there’s been a bigger scandal than Ben Johnson being caught for using steroids I can’t remember it.

It now seems to be broadly accepted that football, rugby and cricket teams in Britain can be packed with players whose association with the home nation they represent is not the strongest.

But the standards accepted by the public and press for other sports aren’t accepted for athletics, it would appear.

You only have to look at the resentment over the ‘plastic Brits’ being parachuted into the GB system in time for the London Olympics, which reached a crescendo last week when hurdler Tiffany Porter was named team captain for the World Indoor Championships.

Michigan-born Porter, who still lives and trains in the US, has an English mother and was signed up for the British cause in 2010.

Britain’s head coach Charles van Commenee made a big error of judgment choosing her as the squad’s leader, especially when he had the likes of Jessica Ennis to turn to, but what you can’t blame the Dutchman for is giving her a GB vest in the first place when every other sport in every other country, as well as our own, takes advantage of ever-blurring regulations for eligibility.

We’d all prefer our Olympians to be born and bred Brits, but that’s not the world we live in.

GB athletics shouldn’t feel duty bound to stand alone.

Error of judgment — Charles van Commenee.