It seems that every time British Athletics has a new Chief Executive, a statement is put out about its poor finances, swiftly followed by a statement that "only genuine medal hopes will be sent to future championships".
Everyone knows its a hopeless, short sighted and potentially discriminatory policy that favours more privileged athletes whose career trajectories have been nurtured early and ideally.
Its more a problem of management than athletes. Poor management besets Britain now. Its expensive and wasteful. There is a funding problem of course but management should be looking into other ways to get these athletes to championships rather than deterring them from the outset. Maybe even self funding or part self funding if not considered a medal hope.
Some crazy decisions have been made in recent years and I'd hoped we had moved away from them. Andy Vernon being asked to run not 1 but 2 qualifying times in the 5000m and 10000m for the Worlds one year after coming quite close to defeating Mo Farah in the Europeans the previous year being one. Another is Eilish McColgan being denied funding because her event was considered too competitive (fortunately she was granted lower level funding on appeal). Imagine if the Norwegians had decided not to bother sending athletes to championships because the event was too competitive due to the African nations' success...