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It took Elliot Jones, an unheralded English 100m sprinter making his international debut at the grand age of 28, to cut through the noise. Asked about all the no-shows at these Commonwealth Games, he began to shake his head, almost in disbelief.
“The national pride I have is so, so high,” he said. “I personally don’t understand why athletes wouldn’t want to come and represent their country, regardless of timetables. I’m going to take every international call I can get.”
For those not counting, nine Team England athletes have withdrawn during the past week, including the former world champions Katarina Johnson-Thompson and Dina Asher-Smith. Most have not given a reason why. The poster girl of these Games, Scotland’s Eilish McColgan, also withdrew on Saturday afer failing to recover from injury in time.
Yet those absentees have created a potential real-life golden ticket for others. And no one grabbed it harder on Monday than Jones, a part-time athlete whose day job is working for Uefa on matchday operations in the Champions League and Europa League.
On Thursday night, he was phoned by the England team’s sprints manager to ask whether he fancied running in the 100m after Louis Hinchliffe pulled out. “Let me think about that,” he replied, before shouting: “Yes!”
“I had to get the Glasgow bus at 9 the next morning, quickly pack and restructure my training plan but it’s fine, we’re always ready,” he said. “It was supposed to take us six hours but it took us seven with the traffic.”
And having got here, Jones was in no mood to mess about in his first major championship as he ran 10.07sec to qualify third overall for the semi-finals on Tuesday.
It was heartening to hear – especially given that several Olympic and world champions are missing, including Keely Hodgkinson, Letsile Tebogo and Julien Alfred, the women’s 100m champion in Paris whose poster is outside the Scotstounhill train station.
A similar message was delivered by Wales’ Jeremiah Azu, the world indoor 60m champion last year, after he had scooted through his 100m heat in 10.10. Asked why he had decided to go to Glasgow, he pointed to the word Cymru on his vest. “Because of this,” he said. “To put this vest on is such a privilege and an honour, and I would never put that opportunity to the side. I would never disrespect the flag like that.”
Despite the absence of the 100m world champion Oblique Seville, a strong men’s field still includes the likes of Nigeria’s Kanyinsola Ajayi, who ran 9.84 to win the London Diamond League ahead of Seville just over a week ago.
Yet on the women’s side the story is very different. Startlingly, six of the top 10 100m times in 2026 have also been run by Commonwealth athletes – none of whom are actually running the event in Glasgow. However, England’s Imani-Lara Lansiquot, who has two 4x100m Olympic medals to her name, said she was delighted to be at the “Friendly Games”.
“I think this competition is a great springboard for athletes,” she said. “And it’s a great springboard for us as a country, in a time where it feels very divided. You walk around our hotel, the energy is buzzing. Everyone has that sense of togetherness, and that’s what I love about this competition.”
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That mood was reflected in a surprisingly strong crowd of 7,500 on the opening morning, despite temperatures in the low teens. As Billy Connolly once joked: “There are two seasons in Scotland, June and Winter.” Yet on the track and off, it soon warmed up.
And they cheered everyone on, including stragglers like Tye Leo-Stroud of Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha, who ran a season’s best 11.85 in the men’s 100m – nearly two seconds behind. “It was cold – I didn’t expect it,” Leo-Stroud said. “Where I am from is very hot, both during day and at night. I pulled my hamstring a couple of years ago. It’s a bit tight.”
There will be lots of good races in the days ahead, especially in the men’s mile when the new world record holder, Josh Kerr, faces off against his compatriot Jake Wightman and the brilliant new Australian star, Cam Myers. The women’s 800m, meanwhile, is also a tantalising rematch between Kenya’s Lilian Odira and England’s Georgia Hunter-Bell, who finished first and second at the world championships.
At the end of the first session on Monday, England Athletics’ team leader Scott Grace defended those who had pulled out, saying that some had preferred to focus on the European championships in Birmingham in two weeks’ time. “Because when you’re a world-class athlete, putting your body through three rounds here, three rounds there, is hard,” he said.
True. But in a market place where track and field is fighting for every eyeball it can get, the lack of sustained star power during a home Games matters.
Euan Crumley, the editorial director of Athletics Weekly, said: “On my train to Scotstounhill, I heard a lot of spectators asking which athletes would actually be here. Some are – like Amy Hunt. But not all the names they mentioned will be, sadly.”
