Unlike this year’s FINA World Aquatics Championships, the 2022 Commonwealth Games are still on schedule to take place. Swimming events, including para-swimming, are scheduled to span Friday, July 29th through Wednesday, August 3rd in Birmingham, England.
We now know the first round of athletes set to represent the host nation in the pool, as an initial 10-strong squad has been revealed by Swim England.
Heading up the roster is 200m freestyle Olympic champion Tom Dean. Breaststroking multi-gold medalist and World Record holder Adam Peaty is also among the competitors, as is 200m back bronze medalist from Tokyo Luke Greenbank.
Recent FINA Short Course World Championships racers Ben Proud and Molly Renshaw are among the competitors, with the former having snagged 50m free gold and the latter 200m breast bronze in Abu Dhabi last December.
Olympic finalists Max Litchfield, Anna Hopkin and Abbie Wood are also among the lineup as are James Wilby and Alicia Wilson.
Per Swim England’s selection policy, the organization could have nominated a total of 34 swimmers to compete in Birmingham. This first batch of swimmers were named based on performances at the 2020 Olympic Games last summer in Tokyo. For additional athletes, this April’s British Swimming Championships will represent the second selection opportunity.
There is a maximum of three swimmers per individual event and one relay team per relay event can be selected and the final team announcement is expected in May.
Although Australia were far and away the leaders of the swimming medal table at the previous edition of the Commonwealth Games on the Gold coast in 2018 with 73 medals, England secured runner-up status with 24. Among the medalists for England were Proud grabbing gold in the 50m free and Peaty and Wilby collecting 5 medals among them across the breaststroking events.
I agree, everyone should earn their place.
Personally I don’t agree with pre selections. I think everyone should have to earn their place on the team in the year concerned. 10 pre selections out of a team of 34 takes up an awful lot of places and takes away the hopes of those who might just have a chance of qualifying. It makes it very difficult for someone to break into the top tier, if selections are made partly based on last years’ performances. Anything could happen between last summer and this one – injuries or illnesses which affect training or just a loss of form. Most of those would be expected to be on the team of course, but they should still have to prove it… Read more »
I can’t imagine Guy won’t be selected whatever happens – I think Swim England/Team England just have to make sure they ‘go through the process’ in terms of selection.
After Dean, Guy and Whittle will be very important for relays, so I imagine they will definitely be on the team.
Adam Barrett maybe back too?
All fun and games until England looks for a female 100 backstroker for the medley relays.
The top 5 GB LC 100 back swimmers are all either Scottish or Welsh but just beyond them there is a very strong group of English juniors, and 1 or 2 have a realistic chance of putting themselves in the mix for the relay spot. But we simply don’t know yet because most of them haven’t had the opportunity to properly race LC at a GB level meet for over 2 years. I expect 1 or 2 top class English female backstrokers to emerge soon but maybe not soon enough for commonwealth this year.
We’ll claim a little bit of Kathleen Dawson, some of us still remember her days as a Warrington girl haha
James Guy?
I mean, did he swim an individual event at the Olympics? Hie did get a bronze at LC euros in the 100 fly in 50.99 which was only .25 off of what it took to get bronze in Tokyo. Jamie is a great swimmer with a fantastic 100 fly.
IIRC he scratched the 100 fly in Tokyo to focus on relays
Yes, meaning he did not swim an individual event at Olympics
Duncan Scott wasn’t selected in the first round?? huh
He’s Scottish
Same thing
Fool!
Scotland has a seperate team at games so no.
This are England selections. Scott and Dawson have already been announced for Scotland.
whoops, forgot this wasn’t great britain
Duncan Scott is Scottish not English.
Wilson is also an Olympic finalist.
Yes, looks like they went with individual Olympic finalists for their first round of selections (Wilmott also made a final, but has retired now).
I would imagine most of (maybe all) the other olympians will be added later on, which is, off the top of my head, Guy, Whittle, J. Litchfield, Bird, Peters, Anderson, Stephens, Vasey.
Bird is Welsh. I can’t see much changing with selections until after the British champs in early April. There are too many swimmers who could potentially emerge there. It will be the first proper, full British meet in over 2 years. Loads of young swimmers who would normally have emerged over the last couple of years but haven’t been able to due to lack of training and competition opportunities.
All bar the national centres had significant training disruptions throughout 2020 and most of 2021. Getting meets back up and running in 2021 was a slow process and there have still been problems with meet cancellations already this year.
The UK is still very much in the recovery phase of competitive… Read more »