Stratford's Andrew Pozzi to line up against Jamaican stars Hansle Parchment and Omar McLeod in Birmingham Diamond league
STRATFORD star Andrew Pozzi will line up against reigning Olympic champion Hansle Parchment and former Olympic champion Omar McLeod in the 110m hurdles at the Müller Birmingham Diamond League at the Alexander Stadium next month.
The 29-year-old, who won the global 60m hurdles title in Birmingham in 2018, has overcome a number of challenges in recent times, but with a new UK-based training and coaching set-up, he is focussed on a return to the kind of form that saw him run a personal best-equalling 13.14s in Monaco in 2020.
Having finished seventh in the 110m hurdles at the Olympic Games in Tokyo earlier this year, the 2017 European indoor champion and 2021 runner-up then made it to the semi-final stage of the 2022 World Athletics Indoor Championships.
“We have a packed season of athletics ahead and I have big goals,” said Pozzi, who most recently clocked a wind-aided 13.46 in the final of the PURE Athletics Spring Invitational meeting in Florida on Saturday.
“I’ve been training well and I know that the times I’m capable of can get me onto the podium, I just have to keep working hard until I reach those standards and at the right time.
“I was disappointed not to reach the final of the World Indoors in Belgrade, but I’m continuing to make progress as I build towards the start of the summer and the prospect of three huge championships to aim for.
“Having finished seventh in the Tokyo Olympic final, I want to improve on that in Eugene and I’m excited to do so.
"I was sixth in the final of the Europeans in 2018 so I’ve got unfinished business there, and of course the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham – which is so close to home for me – will be incredibly special with friends and family filling the stands.”
He added: “I have so much to look forward to and I’m excited to compete in the refurbished Alexander Stadium and to get things back under way at the highest level at the Müller Diamond League in Birmingham.”
Pozzi, Parchment and McLeod are joined in an impressive line-up by World Championships bronze medallist and reigning European champion Pascal Martinot-Lagarde, who was fifth in Tokyo and second at the 2022 World Indoors; Olympic finalist Aurel Manga, a former world and European indoor medallist; and Great Britain’s David King who was sixth in the final of the 2022 World Indoor Championships.
The Müller Birmingham Diamond League is the second meeting of the 2022 Wanda Diamond League series and takes place on Saturday, 21st May.
The series comprises 14 meetings in total, starting with Doha on Friday, 13th May and concluding with a single final across two days in Zurich (7th-8th September). Each meeting will be broadcast globally in a live two-hour programme.
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