Gregan wins as Ireland avoid relegation

Ireland steered well clear of relegation in League 1 of the European Team Championships in Morton Stadium over the weekend to record their best ever placing of seventh but the “sporting extravaganza” that was promised never materialised.

The Irish athletes produced on the track with Brian Gregan delivering Ireland’s sole individual victory in the 400m in 46.32 in very windy conditions on Saturday. Gregan went on to anchor the men’s 4 by 400m relay team in the last race of the competition yesterday in 3:08.12.

“The boys set it up perfectly,” said Gregan of team-mates Jason Harvey, Dara Kervick and Richard Morrissey. “I just got out there and ran like hell. To come home with another 12 points is something special.”

Team manager Patsy McGonagle was happy with the team’s performance and was never worried about the prospect of relegation.

“I think it’s the best performance I’ve seen,” said McGonagle as Ireland bettered their previous best of eighth at Budapest in 2010. “What’s exciting about it is we have an average age of 22/23 and going forward it’s a very positive squad. I’m delighted with the way it went. We did spin the story about relegation but it was never going to be an issue.”

While the athletes did their best to come a respectable 7th of 12 teams, the event failed to capture the imagination of the public as was built up at the press conference on Friday.

It was stated that the stadium would be full and that 1,000 tickets were sold at €10 apiece and the athletics clubs had taken up 3,000 free tickets in a promotion offer but this failed to bear fruit.

However Pierce O’Callaghan, head of marketing for the event, was pleased with the turnout. He said: “European Athletics have confirmed it is the biggest crowd that has ever attended the first League in the history of the competition and seven countries televised it. I would say we would have had 6,000 over the course of the weekend.”