Athletics: Recent defeats may have deflected the focus from Ireland's main medal hope, but they haven't undermined his self-belief, he tells Ian O'Riordan.

With all the hype surrounding Derval O'Rourke it's easy to forget that, on paper at least, Alistair Cragg remains Ireland's best hope for a gold medal at the European championships, which begin in Gothenburg on Monday. His 5,000-metre time of 13:08.97 run in New York in June still tops the European summer rankings, and he is after all the European indoor 3,000-metre champion.

It's easy to forget too that Cragg finished fourth in the world indoor 3,000 metres last March behind the three leading Africans and was also the only European to make the Olympic 5,000-metre final in Athens 2004 (where he finished 12th).

At 26 he's close to his prime, and everything he's done this year has been geared toward peaking for the final of the 5,000 metres on Sunday week.

One of the reasons there's a little less hype about Cragg is that he's lost his last two races, both over 1,500 metres - taking second to Liam Reale in the national championships and finishing a disappointing seventh in London last Friday. He also dropped out of his last 5,000m race, in Paris, a few weeks ago.

Yet Cragg remains openly upbeat about his chances of gold. He's been winding down his training in London this week while staying with his parents, and will fly to Gothenburg on Sunday. It's clear that if someone is going to beat him he'll have to work damn hard for it.

"I might have been lacking a little bit mentally in those last few races," he admits, "and my mind wasn't in them like it should be. But the training has gone perfect. All the steps towards Gothenburg have been fine, and I've done everything in the build-up to Gothenburg that I set out to do.

"I'm a little down on losing the nationals, but there was a bigger picture to look at. So to be honest I'm not one bit worried about what happened in those two 1,500-metre races. I can run 62-63-second laps all day, and I've always been able to kick a lot faster off 5,000-metre pace.

"And I like the pressure of being the number one in Europe. It will also push me on knowing there are people out there watching me on TV. Especially in those dying stages of the race, when I'm tired and hurting, and thinking silver is not that bad.

"But I am starting to learn about myself a lot more. Maybe I do take the races prior to major championships a little lighter than I should. Other people look into them a lot. I usually brush them off. I know how hard I've trained, other people don't. And it's been a great year's training."

Cragg's experience is now standing to him too in that he's not getting worked up about who he has to beat. The main threat will likely come from the Spanish duo; Juan Carlos de la Ossa has run 13:09.84, and Francisco Javier has run 13:11.01. The British youngster Mohammed Farah is the other obvious threat, having run 13:09.40 - the second-fastest in Europe this year.

"I don't think about that," adds Cragg, "because you never know. Time-trialling and racing are two different things, and the sad thing is not too many Europeans get to race in this situation. So you don't really know their strengths in a championship race.

"So I am going in there pretty blind . . . I've just got to make sure I want it bad enough.

"And it may be the most important race of my career. Beijing is probably the peak of my career, but in terms of a real, honest shot at gold, and going into a race as favourite, this is it"

No Irish male has won an outdoor European title. Ronnie Delany (bronze in 1958), Frank Murphy (silver in 1969) and Eamonn Coghlan (silver in 1978) came close, and Cragg will go down in history if he succeeds.

And though born in South Africa, he's also aware of what it would mean to the sport.

"I'll always be the Alistair Cragg born in South Africa," he says. "But I hope when people watch me run they'll be hoping that the Irishman will win.

"I didn't grow up in Ireland, but I know I find myself sitting there watching golf or whatever and hoping Padraig Harrington wins or whoever.

"I spent a lot of time in Ireland this summer, driving around places like Cork and Waterford. And I'd like to think I know Dublin quite well. So I've got to know a lot about the country I represent. It's been great."

He'll have further inspiration in that his Mayo-born coach, John McDonnell, who took Cragg under his wing at Arkansas University, will be in Sweden.

"I am very dependent on him," says Cragg, "and that's where we connect . . . him coming out to support me will be special."

Special enough, perhaps, to inspire him to the one gold medal Irish male distance running still craves.