It was a disappointing night last night as Craig Mottram really screwed the pooch in a very slow 5000m final.
Craig Mottram has been left searching for explanations after finishing a distant 13th in the 5,000m at the world athletics championships in a race tailor-made for winner Bernard Lagat.
After Kenyan Ben Limo stepped aside from the lead with six laps to go, Mottram took up the front-running in a race being run at a sluggish pace.
But the Australian was unable to step it up when the pace was on in the final two laps.
A quick Australian wrap up about this event. It’s clear that Australia is top heavy with medal chances but have no depth. Leading into Beijing, the potential exists for Australia to walk away with four medals in Athletics, Pittman, Mottram, Deakes and Hooker if everything breaks right, however there doesn’t seem to be much below that when you look at the points table which aggregates placings from gold through to eight.
Athletics Australia needs to have a few more athletes who can get top ten placings, something that would indicate some potential to push through to a medal performance level.
Still, if the four names mentioned were to fulfill their potential at Beijing (or if they had at Osaka) it would still be a great result because Athletics is surely the most competitive global event there is with participation coming from all corners of the globe.
