Eilidh Doyle: GB team at World Championships made me proud

Mo Farah storms to 10,000m gold on the opening day of the World Championships in London

A warm familiarity enveloped the event – the iconic stadium surrounded by other famous Olympic Park venues and landmarks, the chirpy, high-fiving volunteers, even a good few of the  performers on the track helped stir the memories.

It was also a reminder of how far Britain has come as a sporting nation in the past five years. Pre-London 2012 there was a palpable anxiety that it might all turn out a bit of an embarrassing shambles, both organisationally and in the arenas of competition.

Where once there was doubt, now glows a brimming confidence that the UK can host major events as well, if not better, than anywhere on the planet and that our athletes can rise to the occasion, compete with and beat the world’s best.

Heading into these championships, as the strong ticket sales became evident and the mouth-watering storylines loomed large, there was a fairly widespread anticipation that this was going to be a riveting ten days of sport.

And so it proved, though not without hiccups, controversy and dispiriting moments. The beleaguered governing body was hoping this could be the event which would represent a new chapter and a move away from the problems that have dogged the sport for years, chiefly doping. Predictably, however, in some ways it provided an opportunity to shine the spotlight even brighter on an issue which isn’t going away any time soon.

That new-found sporting confidence, reaffirmed in Rio, was perhaps behind the ambitious Team GB medal target of six to eight medals. It was, to be fair, eventually met at the lower end in the very last event of the programme when the men took 4x400m bronze, completing a clean sweep of metalwork from the relay events. But, as decathlon legend Daley Thompson said, that shouldn’t paper over the cracks of what was often a challenging week for the home team.

Sir Mo Farah provided the only two individual medals, and he is now off to the roads. With Jessica Ennis-Hill retired, Christine Ohuruogu about to and Greg Rutherford injured, the team was lacking in athletes who have proved they can beat the world in a solo capacity.

The belief seemed to be that the “home Games” effect would take hold and some incredible British performances would spring up and lead to a couple of surprise medals. Instead some genuine contenders seemed to freeze under the pressure of the home crowd: Katarina Johnson-Thompson in the heptathlon, Sophie Hitchon in the hammer, Andrew Pozzi in the 110m hurdles, Holly Bradshaw in the pole vault and Robbie Grabarz in the high jump.

There were plenty of breakthrough British displays, of course, it’s just that many of them were left with agonising fourths. Great Britain skipper Eilidh Doyle, who finished her hugely enjoyable captaincy stint with a superb  silver in the women’s 4x400m, was certainly looking back on the ten days with nothing but positivity about the future.

“You’ve got to look at the bigger picture. We’ve made the target but we’ve also had some really excellent results,” said the 30-year-old Scot.

“Look at the sprinters. The 4x100m boys are world champions. They beat America, they beat Jamaica.

“But also you look at the finals and personal bests – how many people finished higher than they were ranked coming in?

“If you look at the team as a whole, we’ve performed really well. We might have just made the medal target but sometimes that’s irrelevant. You look at the bigger picture  and I’m super proud of this team.”

Doyle, pictured right, along with Aberdeen 22-year-old Zoey Clark, are the two from the record 16 Scots in the British team who return with medals after that 4x400m silver and the captain has bristled a bit when it is said the achieved medal target was only down to Farah and the relays, pointing out that a relay medal is still a considerable feat. For GB to get on the podium in all four is certainly a  terrific achievement.

Former Scottish Athletics head of coaching Stephen Maguire, who is now head of sprints, hurdles and relays at British Athletics, certainly has a good hand to play if any contract talks are due in the near future.

Investing in the relays follows the recent template across UK sport of homing in on sports and events where medals look achievable and pumping in the focus and funding.

Elsewhere, things are a bit more complex. Laura Muir discovered, if she didn’t already know, with a bit of relish you suspect, that a lot of graft, sweat and tears lie ahead if she is going to take the next step to true world class.

You imagine that the heartbreaking fourth in the 1,500m might actually be a good thing for future motivation in terms of adding extra fuel to her already bright-burning fire compared to if she had sneaked that bronze.

A Farah, Paula Radcliffe or Liz McColgan – Brits capable of taking on and beating the top Africans at the longer distances – don’t come around very often but Muir looks capable of joining that esteemed company  given time.

For the other Scots in that bumper tartan contingent it was, on the whole, a positive championships. Some fell a bit short but many targets were hit and there were excellent personal bests from the likes of Clark, who made it to the 400m semi-finals, Callum Hawkins, a fine fourth in the marathon and Eilish McColgan, who sliced four and a half seconds off her previous mark in the 5,000m heat and then ran close to it again in the final.

Overall, it was a memorable and utterly compelling ten days of sport which unfolded in front of packed, enthusiastic crowds.

There seems near universal agreement that these were easily the best athletics world championships since they were launched in 1983 but any hopes they will mark a bright new dawn for track and field would be premature.

The retirement of Usain Bolt leaves a chasm, rulings on whether to allow Russia back in and on the highly sensitive intersex and hyperandrogenous issue which involves 800m champion Caster Semenya are waiting down the line. The general doping issue remains a ubiquitous talking point.

And, in a classic example of administrative foot-shooting following a successful advance, the next world championships in 2019 are to be held in dreary Doha, which is sure to  be a sparsely-attended, soulless  affair compared to the uplifting enthusiasm we have just experienced  in London.

It brings to mind a reworking of the famous Mrs Merton question posed to Debbie McGee: “So IAAF, what first attracted you to taking your flagship event to the oil rich desert emirate of Qatar?”