Athletics: The health of athletics in Britain is close to an all-time low but there is still reason for optimism in Helsinki

That is a lot of talent to be without at a global event - and yet the year in question, 1993, saw Britain have their most successful World Championships ever, with Linford Christie, Sally Gunnell and Colin Jackson bringing home gold and others contributing three silvers and four bronzes.

Although there are notable absentees again as Britain prepare for the 10th World Championships which get under way in Helsinki on Saturday - including the double Olympic champion, Kelly Holmes - the list is nothing like as long. And yet the expectations are nothing like as great, which is a measure of the relative dearth of world-class performers.

Dave Moorcroft, the chief executive of UK Athletics, admitted last weekend that the team which will compete in Helsinki has not got the strength in depth of that which travelled to Athens for last summer's Olympics, and added that UK Athletics was "prepared for flak" from the media.

British athletes do not have a hope of earning 10 medals, as they did in Stuttgart 12 years ago. Indeed, some experienced observers are predicting that they might finish without even one.

Have we got worse? Or has the world got better? It's a bit of both.

When the first World Championships were held in 1983, at the Olympic stadium which hosted the 1952 Games and which will serve as the venue for the forthcoming event in Finland, a total of 153 nations took part. By 1999, that total had topped 200, and the level remains there this year.

Helsinki 1983 saw Britain claim seven medals, with golds coming courtesy of Steve Cram in the 1500m and Daley Thompson in the decathlon, but the general picture of the sport has altered since then, with increasing numbers of countries forcing their way on to the podium.

Yesterday's protestations by the Kenyan president, who called upon his athletes to resist the financial lure which has already seen so many of their fellow countrymen switch nationality to oil-rich nations such as Qatar and Bahrain, only serve to highlight another factor which is causing the world of athletics to become increasingly disparate.

"The whole picture has changed," said Stan Greenberg, the respected athletics statistician. "There are so many more countries now capable of getting results in a few disciplines, and each time they do that it nibbles away at the opportunities for Britain.

"I know some people are saying Britain will only win one or two medals, or even none, but I think we can get four. I will be very disappointed if we don't. And if we do manage that, I think it will represent a renaissance for us because it will be bucking the trend that we have seen in recent years."

Britain won two medals at the 2001 World Championships in Edmonton - a gold from Jonathan Edwards and a bronze from Dean Macey - and two years ago in Paris the total was only one better.

A greater insight into the health of the nation's athletics has been provided by the points system so beloved of L'Equipe, whereby gold medallists earn eight points, silver medallists seven, all the way down to one point for getting in the last eight.

On that basis, Britain's points total has declined steady since the figure of 95 in 1993. Two years later in Gothenburg, despite Jonathan Edwards's startling emergence as the finest triple jumper the world has ever seen, the figure was 78.5, and it dropped by two at the 1997 World Championships in Athens.

Seville in 1999 provided a healthier medal count of seven, including a gold for Colin Jackson in the high hurdles, but the points total was only 66. The figures for Edmonton 2001 and Paris 2003 were, respectively, 54 and 46.

Greenberg believes, however, that Britain can buck that trend in Helsinki despite the fact that even the newly installed UK Athletics performance director, Dave Collins, has referred to this as a "transition year" for the sport.

And one can hardly argue with Collins's analysis when watching BBC coverage of the sport, where relatively unknown performers are, on occasions, interviewed by a dazzling cast of retired champions such as Jonathan Edwards, Sally Gunnell, Colin Jackson and Steve Cram.

Greenberg, however, insists on a little optimism. "I can see us getting to the final in at least 12 events, and that would be an encouraging mark for British athletics," he said."

He has highlighted the eight events where he feels British medal possibilities reside - the women's 10,000m and marathon events, where he feels Paula Radcliffe will get one medal at least, the triple jump, where Nathan Douglas is third in the world rankings, both sets of 400m relays, the heptathlon, where the Olympic bronze medallist Kelly Sotherton is offering evidence that her mid-season malaise has ended, the 100m relay and the 400m, where Tim Benjamin's recent win at Crystal Palace has established him as an outside hope for a podium place.

Part of Greenberg's measured optimism, and talk of a renaissance, is due to the recent showings by British athletes in the World Youth Championships, where Harry Aikines-Aryeetey won an unprecedented 100m and 200m double, the European Under-23 championships, when the high hurdler David Hughes and the 400m hurdler Rhys Williams earned gold, and the European Junior Championships, where Britain ended up with six gold medals and a clean sweep in the 100 metres.

Those are the kind of statistics which offer any nation legitimate grounds for hope, albeit that they have all been achieved within a European setting.

What has profoundly altered the prevailing atmosphere within athletics is the awarding of the 2012 Games to London, a factor which Greenberg says will be highly significant over the course of the next seven years. "Because of that, a lot of youngsters who might previously be lost to the sport are going to be determined to stick around," he said.

Inevitably, London's triumph will generate increased funding for athletics, given that it is the pre-eminent Olympic sport, and the youngsters who are taking to the track now stand to benefit from support that previous generations can only have dreamed of.

But the likelihood is that, by Sunday week, many media commentators will be commenting disparagingly on the contrast between Britain's fortunes in the inaugural World Championships in Helsinki and the latest ones.

Unfairly, but realistically, much will depend upon Paula Radcliffe to determine the way in which Britain's efforts are viewed. If she manages to win a gold medal, whether it be in the 10,000m (unlikely) or the marathon (more likely) the perception of Helsinki in years to come will be coloured by her comeback from the previous year's disappointments in Athens.

Since 1993, Britain have never won more than one gold at any World Championship - but one is enough. Should Radcliffe's double gamble fail to pay off, however, the public is unlikely to embrace an encouraging points total with much enthusiasm. Having seen London rise to the occasion, expectations of the nation's athletes have probably risen accordingly.