Reports by Ziad Chaudry, Sami Mokbel & Mike Fleet

Tasha Danvers-Smith is fully focused on next year's Olympic Games after reaching the 400m hurdles final in World Athletic Championships in Osaka last week.

Disappointingly for the Croydon athlete, she could only manage last place in a time of 54.94secs in Thursday's final behind gold medalist Jana Rawlinson.

The 29-year-old AAA's champion and Commonwealth Games silver medalist, running from lane two, started the race well and was in contention with the leaders but faded in the final straight.

Danvers-Smith recorded a lifetime best time of 54.08 secs in her semi final - and the hurdler chose to focus on that instead of her disappointing display in the final.

She said: "What can I say? Nobody likes to finish bloody last do they?

"But you know, I ran 54.9, even if that would have been in the semi, it still would have been faster than anything I've ran all year long. So to put together three good runs in four days, I'm happy about that.

"Obviously I did want to be up there in the medals, but it just wasn't my day. I knew if I was going to be in with them, I had to go out with them. You can't really hold back in the final. You have to go for it, because they're going to be running 53sec pace. I knew this before the gun went off."

Despite her final despair Danvers-Smith has vowed not to reflect on what could have been and insists she is fully focused on Beijing.

"I have got the Olympics engrained in my head right now. Sometimes I've forgot I've been training for this, because my mind is switched to 2008. I'm as good as anybody out there, so it's just a matter of getting it out at the right time."

After his below par performance in the individual 400m, Croydon Harrier Martyn Rooney helped Great Britain's 4x400m team to a respectable sixth place behind the all conquering USA team, led home by individual gold medalist Jeremy Wariner.

And Rooney insists the young 4x400m team, that included Andrew Steele, Robert Tobin and Richard Buck, can go from strength to strength.

He said: "The oldest in the team is 23. We are very young and there is a lot to come. It is a big jump from junior to senior level and we have learned a lot by being here."

Croydon sprinter Joice Maduaka endured a topsy-turvy time in Osaka after she was eliminated in the quarter-final of the 200m but helped the 4x100m team to a fourth place finsih in the final on Sunday.