Athletics: Manchester reign dampens expectations

Munich 2002: Veterans Backley and Jackson hope to go one better than Michael Owen in stadium of dreams

The last time a national team from these shores made the trip to Munich's Olympiastadion they did so surrounded by an air of some trepidation, with the fitness of their captain in question, and, for good measure, with a man by the name of Campbell designated to fill a key role. Plus ça change.

Following in the studmarks of England's footballers, Britain's athletes will be more than happy if they achieve the track and field equivalent of the result secured by Sven Goran Eriksson's men in the same Bavarian arena last September. Instead of five goals to one, five golds and more perhaps? We shall see, between Tuesday and Sunday, as the home heroes and heroines of the XVIIth Commonwealth Games leave behind their land of hope and glory for Germany and the XVIIIth European Championships.

The flag-waving pomp and circumstance of six glorious days in the City of Manchester Stadium is still fresh in the memory, of course, and the lactic acid is still in the legs: two reasons why Max Jones, in his track and field Eriksson role, is advising caution and restraint with regard to the post-Manchester mood of national expectation.

"I would ask people not to expect a Manchester in Munich," Jones, the performance director of UK Athletics, said. "The problem is we've never had one major Games so close to another before. The last time we had something similar, in 1986, it was 21 days and that is enough to get back home, have a rest, have 10 days' productive training and come out on top form again."

There were in actual fact 24 days between the final athletics session at the 1986 Commonwealth Games in Edinburgh and the European Championships in Stuttgart, where Linford Christie (100m), Roger Black (400m), Sebastian Coe (800m), Steve Cram (1500m), Jack Buckner (5,000m), Daley Thompson (decathlon), the men's 4 x 400m relay team and Fatima Whitbread (javelin) all hit the gold standard for Britain.

"The difference now," Jones continued, "is that we're asking athletes to go home, change their suitcases and come back out again. So it's a step into the unknown in a way. It's rather like asking Lennox Lewis to fight the day after he's had a world title fight or the England football team to have a match the day after they've played against Germany.

"I think it'll be a mixed bag. Some people will cope with it. Some will go on to do even better things. Some people will be fatigued. I would ask people to look at Manchester and Munich together rather than looking at Munich separately, because a lot of athletes will be emotionally and physically drained." The Campbell in the team, Darren Campbell, has already testified to that. In the wake of his home-town medal winning efforts (bronze in the 200m, gold in the 4 x 100m relay), the Mancunian speed merchant confessed: "I just feel emotionally drained. It's quite difficult to think that in a few days' time I'll be trying to retain my European 100m title when I really just want to go home and call an end to the season. I just hope people don't put too much pressure on us." Jones, for one, is refraining from that, talking not in terms of gold medal targets but of hopes for an overall medal tally of "perhaps 14... if everything goes well." Britain won 16 medals at the last European Championships in Budapest four years ago, nine of them gold.

Campbell won two golds, in the 100m and 4 x 100m relay. This time he will be going for three, in the same two events plus the 200m. He will be joined in the shorter sprint by the captain of the British men's team, Dwain Chambers, whom, according to Jones, has recovered from the calf cramping that afflicted him halfway through the 100m final in Manchester. "Physically, Dwain's 100 per cent," Jones reported. "Mentally, if he can get himself ready I'm sure he can do very well in Munich." Chambers is one of six British athletes who head the European rankings in their events and one of several for whom the experience of failure in Manchester may well stoke motivational fires for Munich. Colin Jackson is in the same bracket, although for the 35-year-old Welshman there is the added incentive of another niche in the annals.

The silver he won behind Shaun Bownes of South Africa was his 24th individual medal in a major championship, one more than Kathy Cook and Linford Christie achieved in the course of their distinguished careers. Now Jackson could become the first British athlete to win a fourth successive European crown in the same event. That, however, depends on Steve Backley's fate in the javelin.

Backley also happens to be on a roll of three European titles and the final of his event is scheduled for Friday, the day before Jackson's. The man of Kent faces more formidable opposition, though. The Russian Sergey Makarov and the Greek Konstantinos Gatsioudis have both thrown beyond 90m this summer and Jan Zelezny, the Czech who check-mated Backley with his last throw in the Olympic final in Sydney two years ago, is desperate to find the Midas touch he needs to complete a full set of major championship gold medals.

As it is, both Britons stand to go one better than Michael Owen in Munich. Their hat-tricks are already in the bag.