The European Indoor Championships ended on a controversial note in Apeldoorn after the Netherlands’ team, who had provided a golden finish to the event in the women’s 4x400m relay, were disqualified and then reinstated as champions.
With King Willem-Alexander of the Netherlands watching on, the quartet of Lieke Klaver, Nina Franke, Cathelijn Peeters and Femke Bol clocked a championships and Dutch record of 3:24.34 to finish ahead of Great Britain’s national record of 3:24.89, with the Czech team also setting a national best (3:25.31) in third.
However, when footage showed Peeters obstructing Amber Anning at the final handover, a British appeal was lodged. The hosts were initially disqualified but, after a counter appeal and a lengthy delay, it was decided they would ultimately take gold.
It is understood that the Dutch counter protest was successful due to an error made by the officials, who had mistakenly lined the British handover up on the inside lane as if they were leading, when in fact at the point when the order is decided it was the Netherlands who led and should have been closest to the kerb.
Afterwards, the British team were philosophical about the outcome, though Anning said: “It happened so quickly that I didn’t even realise [about the incident] until I looked back at the video but I did feel like my momentum was stopped and that I had to pick up again. Yes, we want the gold medal but it doesn’t take away from our national record.”
The race, which saw five teams break national records, had provided a thrilling finale to these four days of competition and had the Omnisport Arena crowd jumping on day when there were also home gold medals in the men’s 4x400m relay, men’s 800m and women’s shot put. The Dutch very nearly had a men’s pole vault champion to acclaim, too, and finished in top spot on the medal table.
(Getty)
The men’s relay saw them clock 3:04.95 to edge out Spain’s 3:05.18 – the same time recorded by bronze medallists Belgium as Britain finished fourth.
In the 800m, Samuel Chapple also had the fans on their feet after he timed his run for the line to perfection, overtaking Belgium’s long-time leader Elliot Crestan to hit the line in 1:44.88, the Dutchman’s first time ever of breaking the 1:45 mark. Crestan ran 1:44.92 with Ireland’s Mark English completing the podium in 1:45.26.
Poland’s Anna Wielgosz took the women’s 800m title, winning a tactical final with her kick to clock 2:02.09. That time just held off Clara Liberman of France (2:02.32), while Slovenia’s Anita Horvat (2:02.52) secured bronze.
Jessica Schilder was a commanding winner of the women’s shot put, breaking the Dutch record with her fifth-round throw of 20.69m, which is also a world lead. Germany’s Yemisi Ogunleye got closest to the two-time European champion with a second-round effort of 19.56m as Portugal’s Auriol Dongmo recorded 19.26m for third.
In the men’s event, the shock departure of favourite Leonardo Fabbri in morning qualifying had left the door ajar. Romanian Andrei Rares Toader seized the chance and, with the gold already won, produced a national record of 21.27m with his final throw.
Wictor Petersson of Sweden (21.04m) and Czech Tomáš Stanek (20.75m) completed the top three, while British captain Scott Lincoln fell just two centimetres shy of the podium with his best effort.
With serial gold medallist and world record-holder Mondo Duplantis opting not to compete in Apeldoorn Emmanouil Karalis came out on top in an incredibly tight men’s pole vault final.
The Greek won on countback from the Netherlands’ Menno Vloon and Sondre Guttormsen of Norway – all of them having cleared 5.90m.
» Subscribe to AW magazine here, check out our new podcast here or sign up to our digital archive of back issues from 1945 to the present day here