Jersey athletes prepare to take on the Commonwealth

Thursday 17 July 2014

Dozens of athletes are warming up to fly the Jersey flag at the Commonwealth Games next week, as part of the biggest team the Island has ever sent.

40 athletes from ten different sporting disciplines are heading off to Glasgow over the next few days, with the Games starting on 23 July and running until 3 August.

It will be the third time Derek Ferguson has been to the Commonwealth Games, this time as Secretary General of the Island’s Commonwealth Games Association. He said the atmosphere is phenomenal and for many of the Jersey athletes who compete at local and national level, the Games will be “the pinnacle of their success”.

Mr Ferguson said: “We tend not to put the athletes under too much pressure, my expectation is that we will have some athletes doing personal bests, that is all we can ask for. If we can have a sniff of any medal that would be great, we certainly got close to bronze in Melbourne in both the bowling and the badminton. Both have quite strong teams again, on paper at least.”

The Commonwealth Games are held every four years and this time round Jersey will have athletes competing in lawn bowls, badminton, swimming, cycling, gymnastics, triathlon, table tennis, squash, shooting and athletics.