World champions Josh Kerr and Katarina Johnson-Thompson will head Team GB’s Olympic athletics medal hopes after being confirmed in the squad for Paris 2024.
As 2023 World Championship gold medallists, heptathlete Johnson-Thompson and 1500m runner Kerr were among the athletes under less pressure to perform at last week’s UK Athletics Championships, which doubled as the Olympic trials.
They are joined in the squad by Keely Hodgkinson, who will target gold after three successive global 800m silvers, world 400m silver medallist Matthew Hudson-Smith and world indoor pole vault champion Molly Caudery.
Rising star Louie Hinchliffe, the British men’s 100m champion who is coached by American legend Carl Lewis, is selected among the sprinters along with world bronze medallist Zharnel Hughes, Dina Asher-Smith and Daryll Neita.
Former world 1500m champion Jake Wightman is included in the 800m despite missing the trials through injury and 10,000m runner Eilish McColgan also makes the team following a battle to prove her fitness.
Several exciting emerging athletes will appear at their first Olympic Games, including 17-year-old Phoebe Gill after her sensational 800m win in Manchester and British 400m champions Charlie Dobson and Amber Anning.
However, discus thrower Jade Lally and shot putter Amelia Campbell are among those who have criticised the UK Athletics (UKA) selection policy after missing out.
The 11-day athletics programme at the Paris Olympics begins on 1 August.
Kerr, a bronze medallist in Tokyo, will again go head to head with Olympic 1500m champion Jakob Ingebrigtsen in one of the most eagerly anticipated showdowns in Paris.
Johnson-Thompson will attempt to dethrone two-time Olympic heptathlon gold medallist Nafi Thiam, with the Briton buoyed by winning her second world title last summer.
Formidable 22-year-old Hodgkinson will hope to clinch her first global title in the absence of reigning champion Athing Mu, who suffered a fall at the US trials, while Hudson-Smith made his gold medal ambitions clear after narrowly missing out in Budapest.
Caudery is the leading pole vaulter in the world this year and the 24-year-old will seek to maintain her remarkable recent progress by taking the sport’s biggest prize at the first attempt.
Hinchliffe, who is also named in the 4x100m relay squad, is among a host of new names hoping to shine.
The 21-year-old sprinter might look to the example of world 800m bronze medallist Ben Pattison, who reached the podium on his debut at a global championships and is also included in the team for Paris.
Meanwhile, Gill, Dobson and Anning have been in superb form in 2024.
Hughes, who last year achieved a breakthrough individual global medal, will contest both the 100m and 200m events after overcoming a hamstring injury, as will European women’s 100m champion Asher-Smith and 200m silver medallist Neita.
Laura Muir will target another Olympic podium after winning 1500m silver behind two-time champion Faith Kipyegon, joined in that event by British champion Georgia Bell.
Contributing to five athletics medals won by GB in Tokyo three years ago, bronze medal-winning pole vaulter Holly Bradshaw will contest her fourth Games.
In laying out its selection policy for Paris 2024, UKA stated its aim for the Games was to maximise the number of medals won and top-eight placings achieved.
While world medallists were assured of a place if they met the qualifying standard, most athletes had to achieve the standard and secure a top-two finish at the trials.
Wightman, like Hughes, was granted a medical exemption from the trials with a minor calf injury but must settle for an 800m place, while McColgan was deemed to have proven her potential since returning from a long-term injury lay-off despite missing the 10,000m trials at Highgate in May.
For those who do not achieve its entry standard, World Athletics also permits qualification for athletes through world rankings.
However, UKA has declined invitations for athletes who qualify via world ranking but failed to achieve the federation’s own standards.
UKA implemented the standards in disciplines where it considered the World Athletics entry benchmark to be higher than that required to achieve a top-eight placing.
Lally, who missed UKA’s discus qualifying standard by five centimetres but should receive a world ranking invitation, told the Telegraph, external she will have to retire after missing out on the Games, and Campbell said such decisions were “killing the sport in the UK”.
It is a fate also set to be inflicted on steeplechaser Phil Norman, who fell an agonising 0.15 seconds short of the UKA standard at the trials.
On Thursday, three-time Olympic hurdler Andrew Pozzi said he had declined his Paris selection after suffering an ankle fracture in training, and subsequently announced his retirement from the sport.
Megan Keith secured an Olympic debut with victory at the Night of the 10,000m PBs earlier this year, while Phil Sesemann, Emile Cairess, Mahamed Mahamed, Charlotte Purdue, Calli Hauger-Thackery and Rose Harvey had already been selected to contest the marathon events.
