Martin Brockman's Commonwealth Games call-up this week capped a double celebration for the decathlete.

The 22-year-old Medway and Maidstone AC member got the good news from National Combined Events coach Darrell Bunn.

He said: "It was my girlfriend’s birthday so made it a good day. I thought my chances were 50-50. The top eight in the Commonwealth gained automatic selection and I was ranked 10th, so it was a case of waiting and seeing."

Brockman, from Maidstone, secured his selection with a breakthrough performance earlier this month in the North West Combined Events Open in Manchester, his final chance to gain the qualifying standard of 7,300 points in the decathlon.

With two events left, he needed to set lifetime best performances in the javelin and 1500m to have any chance of bettering Ed Dunford’s best of 7,429 points, the third ranked performance by an England athlete in 2010.

He responded by throwing the javelin to 50.08m and then ran 4:26.90 in the 1500m for a final tally of 7,433 points.

Brockman won’t compete again before the Games but plans to train twice a day for the next five weeks before leaving for India.