Shoe-less Griggs battles to eighth in 5000m final

Tyrone's Nick Griggs finished eighth in the men's 5000m final at the European Athletics Championships in Birmingham despite losing a shoe.

The 21-year-old from Candour Track Club came home in a time of 13:21.07 despite his misfortune which saw him battle on over the final three laps to secure a top-eight finish, ahead of fellow Team Ireland athletes Darragh McElhinney and Brian Fay.

Bantry's McElhinney moved to the front with five laps remaining, but was also affected by the incident when Griggs lost his shoe but Norway's Jakob Ingebrigtsen would ultimately pull clear to claim victory with a season's best of 13:15.29, as Germany's Florian Bremm came in second with France's Etienne Daguinos third.

Fay would place 14th in 13:31.15 with McElhinney 18th in 13:37.62.

"Eighth is solid, but I lost my shoe about a mile out. You never expect yourself to be in that position in a European final," Griggs said.

"I was in the stumble and someone clipped my shoe from the back and it came off. It would have been easy for me to drop out and give up, but I tried to keep fighting with the Irish vest on.

"Eighth with one shoe on is not too bad, but it's frustrating because I'm thinking about what I could have done if I was ready to go with two or three laps remaining rather than that happening.

"No one is going to be happy coming eighth and losing a shoe, but it's good progress and I know what I can do."

Finn Valley's Mark English advanced to the semi-finals of the men's 800m, comfortably winning his heat in 1:46.96, but UCD's Cian McPhillips failed to advance, finishing seventh in heat four with a time of 1:46.84.

In the men's shot put, Raheny Shamrock's' Eric Favors took 10th place thanks to a final throw of 19.59m.

Jack Raftery is through to the next round of the men's 400m with a time of 45.81 enough to secure the ninth spot of 12 to advance, while Nicola Tuthill is through to Wednesday's women's hammer final with her second throw of 70.09m sealing her place.