LONDON: Triple jumper Phillips Idowu has angrily criticised former UK Athletics (UKA) coach Charles van Commenee over the British athlete’s preparations for last year’s London Olympics.
Van Commenee accused Idowu of turning his back on UKA in the build-up to the event, after he failed to report for a pre-Olympic training camp in Portugal and was slow to provide details of an injury.
Although he was one of the pre-event favourites, Idowu failed to qualify for the triple jump final, but he claims his performance was not hindered by his preparations for the Games.
In quotes reported by several British newspapers yesterday, Idowu rejected Van Commenee’s criticisms, saying: “Apparently I’d gone missing.
“I was like, ‘That’s b******t.’ UK Anti-Doping know where I am. My coach knows where I am. So for all that to be said and whipped up into a media storm is crap.
“You kind of need to check your facts. I have the evidence, if you want to look at my text messages and see the e-mails. Once I’d pointed that out, UKA wanted to crush the story.”
Idowu, 34, said he had always had minimal contact with UKA and preferred working with his own coaching team.
“For the last four years I’ve been working with my coach and we’ve done the whole thing,” he said.
“I’ve funded my own trips, not on lottery funding. I went to the major championships, when selected, and I came back with medals. Anything outside of that, I had no involvement with UKA.”
He added: “I sort my own medical staff, my own masseuse. Off the back of that I won Olympic silver, world gold, European gold, world silver. I’m working with a pretty decent team.”
Idowu’s next major assignment will be the World Championships in Moscow in August. AFP
