With just under 500 days to go until the Glasgow 2014, England preparations are now well underway.

England Team Leader
Following an openly advertised process an England Team Leader for Glasgow 2014 has been appointed. With his unrivalled experience (both in Wrestling and indeed across the majority of Commonwealth sports,) Shaun Morley was the clear lead candidate at interview. Shaun led the successful England Team to the Delhi Commonwealth Games that achieved the first wrestling medals since the very successful 1994 Games and the first gold since 1986.

The Team Leader interviewing Panel also recognised the talents of Eddy Kavanagh and Trevor Hoskins who put themselves forward as candidates. Mindful of need to pay attention to succession planning, a challenge across many sports where there are limited chances to gain experience in the multi-sport environment, the Panel recommended that Eddy and Trevor be woven into the England campaign wherever possible in order to build their experience and bolster their cv’s for the future.

England National Coach
In a separate openly advertised process, applications were invited for England National Coach for the 2013-17 funding cycle. Following the conclusion of this process, Anatolii Kharytoniuk was appointed.

Prior to his previous appointment with British Wrestling, Anatolii was the Head Coach of the Female National Team of Ukraine and amongst the many Champions he coached is Irina Merleni, who won gold medal at the Athens Olympic Games. Anatolii has many years experience both as a wrestler (silver medallist in World Championships 1975) and as a coach. He has also made a significant contribution to the technical elements of the UKCC coaching programme adopted by British Wrestling across the UK.

Additional funding by Commonwealth England and Sport England For Glasgow 2014
British Wrestling intends to request Commonwealth England and Sport England for specific funding to support the training and competition costs of a small wrestling squad to defend medals won at the last Commonwealth Games in Delhi, the first wrestling medals won in a Commonwealth Games since 1994. Submissions are expected to be requested by the funding bodies shortly. The England Regions have been requested to supply names and profiles of potential medallists for submission to Sport England with only the South still to submit.

England Selection Policy
An England Selection Policy has been drafted and will shortly be circulated to Commonwealth hopefuls to gain their thoughts and input prior to it being submitted to Commonwealth England for approval.

England Squad
In parallel to the request for funding, letters will shortly be circulated to potential athletes and training partners outlining the training programme in the run-up to Glasgow 2014.

Anyone with questions about the England programme should contact the Chief Executive in the first instance at ce@britishwrestling.org