Greg Rutherford insists he is still confident of completing his medal collection in Beijing next month, despite a disappointing showing at this year’s Anniversary Games.
Three years ago the 28-year-old jumped 8.31m to take gold at London’s Olympic Stadium and since then has racked up an impressive medal haul.
Rutherford has gone on to add European and Commonwealth gold to his name and is looking to complete his collection at next month’s World Championships in Beijing.
But if he wants to be crowned world champion then he knows stronger performances are needed after he fouled his first three jumps in Saturday’s competition.
In the end he managed to leap 8.18m to take third behind Marquis Dendy in first and Zarck Visser in second – but that did little to lift the Olympic champion’s mood.
“Obviously last time I was here was the greatest sporting day of my life and then to come away here with a third is not great so I'm not pleased with that at all,” said Rutherford.
“I’m not massively happy with that because obviously I came out here to try and win but I had a bit of a problem with the first three and couldn’t get them in.
“So I’m a bit frustrated with that and I seemed to tire out after those three so annoyingly if I had got them in I think I would have been in a good position.
“But such is life and I’ll have to move on and hopefully I can rectify the mistakes of today.
“When are trying to jump as far as possible you are trying to get as close as you can and sometimes you go over and that’s what happened here.
“I was pretty relaxed about it but it was frustrating because the first fouls were pretty big jumps and when you get them in it fills you with confidence and you can go on to doing bigger things.”
© Sportsbeat 2015