Christopher Koskei, a villain turned hero, stood confirmed as the world's finest steeplechase runner in Seville last evening after a performance which, even by the flamboyant standards of Kenyan athletics, was something special.

In Zurich earlier this month, he had stood accused of devaluing the sport after deliberately stunting his finishing run to allow his friend Bernard Barmasai to win and thus stay on track for a Golden League prize.

Now, however, the job specifications were markedly different as he thrilled spectators in the Olympic Stadium by coming from a long way back to mine gold and maintain a marvellous Kenyan tradition in this grueling event by crossing the line first in eight minutes 11.76 seconds.

Only an athlete of supreme confidence could have run this type of race. At the bell, he was disputing fifth and sixth places, hurdling fluently but still seeing only the backs of his team-mates, Wilson Boit Kipketer and Barmasai.

More than that, the Moroccan Ali Ezzine and Germany's European champion, Damian Kallabis, separated him from the leaders and if he probably knew the score about his fellow Kenyans, he could ill afford to underestimate the two "outsiders" contesting the medals.

Yet, his nerve never deserted him and in the space of 30 or so exhilarating strides, we knew just why. Quickening without any apparent extra effort, he picked off those in front of him, one by one, until he was alone and clear running between the top two bends.

In a sense it was no more than we expected but the manner of its execution was breathtaking. Kallabis, entrusted with the responsibility of retrieving European pride, competed like a spartan only to see Ezzine pass him 15 metres out and ensure an African grand slam.

If that moved the crowd, it was as nothing compared with the reception Niurka Montalvo received when she became the first Spanish winner at these championships by breaking the sand at 7.06 metres to claim the women's long jump title. And with a suitable sense of theatre, she kept the best until last to edge Fiona May and Marion Jones into the minor placings.

Born in Cuba, Montalvo endeared herself to the masses by taking the lead on her first visit to the pit and then effectively destroying Jones's hopes of leaving Seville with four gold medals.

It caught the mood of another exciting evening in which Irish athletics was suitably boosted by Peter Coghlan's arrival in the semi-finals of the 110 metres hurdles and a national record of 2.29 metres by Brendan Reilly in finishing joint eighth in the high jump, won by the Russian, Vyacheslav Voronin.

After a relatively sluggish performance in surviving the heats, Coghlan was considerably closer to his best when claiming the last of the four automatic qualifying places in a time of 13.37 seconds, the fourth fastest of his career.

On his first visit to the track, he clattered the first barrier so hard that he almost fell. He was still knocking obstacles in the quarterfinal but fortunately his speed and strength was such that he got away with it.

"In the sense that my hurdling hasn't clicked so far, I'm happy to be in the semi-finals," he said. "That early mistake was disturbing but my coach Paul Doyle told me between races to put it out of my mind and concentrate on the race coming up. If I get my technique right today, I think there is enough left in the tank to do well in the semi-finals."

Reilly's clearance at 2.29 metres in the high jump was his best in seven years and given his injury problems this year and the last few weeks in particular, it represented a substantial achievement.

It was a a measure of his self-assurance that he didn't enter the competition until 2.25 metres, a height he cleared at the first attempt. His first two attempts at 2.29 failed narrowly but within seconds of Michael Johnson winning his heat of the 400 metres on the track, the Irishman provoked another show of enthusiasm from the stands by rubbing but not knocking the bar.

Higher than he's ever gone, at 2.32 metres, was always going to be an intimidating target and after going close with his first effort, it proved too much for him.

Yet he was quick to express his satisfaction. "I couldn't have hoped for a better performance in my first appearance in an Irish singlet," he said. "If anybody had told me at the start of the season that I'd clear 2.29 and finish eighth in the World Championships, I wouldn't have believed it."

Susan Smith-Walsh's attempt to replicate her achievement in reaching the final of the 400 metres hurdles in Athens two years ago ended in a sense of disillusionment that contrasted sharply with post-race reactions in the past.

Fears that the effort expended in surviving Sunday's preliminaries had eaten into her strength were unhappily substantiated as she tied up almost totally in the run to the line, to finish sixth of eight in the semi-final won by the defending champion, Nezha Bidouane of Morocco in 53.95 seconds.

The Irish girl was timed at 55.20 seconds, slower than her first run, after she had set out to conserve energy in the early part of the race. The tactic looked as if it might just pay off when she progressed to fourth place at the second last barrier but as it transpired, that was the summit of her achievement.

Her stride pattern was already fragmenting approaching the last and with her strength almost emptied, she was overtaken by the Hungarian, Judith Szekers, for fifth place in the last few metres.

Karen Shinkins, likewise, didn't perform to pedigree in finishing seventh of eight in her quarter-final race in the 400 metres. Her time of 52.08 seconds was more than a second outside her national record and left her some way adrift of the first two finishers, Anja Rucker of Germany and the American Michele Collins.

Fastest of the four quarter-final winners was the mature German Grit Breuer who looked impressive in containing the challenge of Nigeria's Olabisi Afolabi.