Collins Shakes Up Coaching

Britain's leading coaches will have their roles redefined as the sport's new performance director Dave Collins begins putting down his mark.

After a satisfactory start to his role when Britain won seven medals in the European Indoor Championships, which ended here on Sunday, the real job begins now for Collins, who officially started only last week.

His first change is to scrap the post of technical director and replace it with a performance manager.

Collins wants people such as John Trower, the javelin thrower Steve Backley's former coach, and Alan Storey, acknowledged as one of the best distance-running coaches, to concentrate on working more closely with athletes.

He intends the performance manager to deal with the administration and coordination which currently take up much of the time of the technical directors.

"There will be a re-emphasis," he said. "There are some very good people there. We need to make best use of them. I'd like to ensure the best coaches coach."

It will be the continuation of a sea change in UK Athletics, started by the appointment of Collins, who himself has no formal coaching qualifications; he is a sports psychologist. He will be aided in his task by the fact that the contracts of all the technical directors are due for renewal at the end of this month.

Another priority will be to appoint a relay coach to succeed Steve Perks, who retired after guiding Britain's 4x100 metres team to the Olympic gold medal. "It's priority 1A," said the former Royal Marine. "It's a short order. I hope to do something by the summer. I have an idea of the person I'd like in that position."

An ideal candidate might be Mike McFarlane, the 1982 Commonwealth 200m champion who coached Dwain Chambers before the sprinter left him to join the Ukrainian-born Remi Korchemny, under whom he tested positive for an anabolic steroid.

Collins acknowledged that these championships were a mixed bag for Britain. Jason Gardener and Mark Lewis-Francis ensured the balance of European sprinting power remained firmly in Britain thanks to their gold and silver medals in the 60m. But too many to whom the championships should have offered an opportunity to make their mark at this level failed.

"Even the best have off days and make mistakes," said Collins. "It's when they have off months and off years you start to worry.

"There were some fantastic performances and some real promise. But there were also a number of disappointments and some lessons we need to learn."

Jo Pavey will miss the world cross-country championships over the weekend of March 19-20 in St Galmier, France, after dropping out of the European indoor 3,000m final in Madrid on Sunday. She aggravated a calf injury in her left leg.