Cragg injury deals blow to medal hopes

MEDAL hope Alistair Cragg has been forced to withdraw from the Irish team for Sunday’s European cross-country championships in Tilburg.

The European indoor 3,000m champion was scheduled to return to Europe yesterday but had to cancel all plans when he was taken ill at the airport.

“Apparently he had a blister on his foot which became infected,” Irish team manager Patsy McGonagle said.

“He had been due to fly to Amsterdam on Wednesday but he had a problem with his passport at the airport and his flight was rescheduled until yesterday.

“He had been complaining of the problem with his foot but was not too concerned about it. Then he became unwell at the airport and was advised not to travel. The current situation is he is at home in Arkansas on a course of antibiotics.”

Last night Paul McNamara from Galway was named as Cragg’s replacement.

From the time Cragg confirmed his participation in the championships, he was listed among the medal favourites after achieving superstar status at the European indoor championships in Madrid last March.

Indeed, that event was his last appearance in an Irish singlet. He was set to compete in the world cross-country championships but a back injury put paid to that and left him sitting out all of the summer.

He returned to competitive running last month and had two confidence-boosting results in the lead up to the European championships.

“He would certainly have been a medal contender,” McGonagle said.

“We had been building our team around him and with national champion Gary Murray running so well and Martin Fagan from Mullingar also in good form, there was a possibility of team medals.

“It is all very disappointing for us and particularly for the athlete himself. Like I said, there was no difficulty rescheduling his flight when he had the problem on Wednesday, and when I spoke to him earlier yesterday he was on his way to the airport but then this happened.”

On Wednesday Cragg said he was coming to Europe to win gold.

“After the European indoor championships you only think about a gold medal,” he said.

He ran his first race for Ireland at the European cross-country championships in Croatia two years ago.

Then he finished eighth when, after a long and arduous flight from the US, he went to the line feeling ill.

He subsequently mixed it with the Africans at the world cross-country championships in Brussels last year and was involved in the sensational 5,000m final at the Athens Olympics.

Last indoor season he created a major shock when he out-kicked world record-holder Kenenisa Bekele over 3,000m in Boston, the first of two big wins over the Africans on the indoor circuit.

But his greatest day came at the European indoor championships in Madrid when he took the gold medal in the 3,000m the same day as David Gillick won the enthralling 400m final to complete a memorable double.

When his outdoor season fell apart as a result of prolonged injury, Cragg singled out the European cross-country championships as his target for another medal and was on course to achieve that until yesterday afternoon.