THE OLD cliché is that fourth is the worst possible place to finish and Charlie Grice certainly won’t argue after missing out on a Commonwealth medal in Gold Coast, writes Paul Eddison.

Grice had high hopes going into the final of the 1500m and the former Olympic finalist made it through his heat as an automatic qualifier.

When it came to the final the 24-year-old from Brighton paced himself early on and was only tenth after 800 metres.

But he began to pick it up from there and eventually came through for fourth in a time of 3:37.43.

He had left himself too much to do for a medal however, with Kenyan duo Elijah Manangoi and Timothy Cheruiyot first and second, with Scotland’s Jake Wightman – whose parents met at the 1990 Commonwealth Games – in bronze.

And for Grice missing out on a spot on the podium was tough to take.

He said: “It’s fourth place and no one wants to come fourth. You’ve got nothing to show for it. I tried to be really relaxed for the first half and I just didn’t really quite have enough.

“The speed is getting there but it’s not quite enough.”

Grice will at least have the opportunity to turn his attention to a second major event in 2018, with the European Championships taking place in Berlin later this year.

His time was inside the 3:40 required to qualify for those Championships, meaning that Grice will be able to improve on the 12th place he managed at the event back in 2014.

However that was little consolation to Grice in the immediate aftermath of his race – the last individual event on the track.

He added: “I might have just scraped the European qualifying time, so that’s something.”

npower is the Official Partner of Team England and is giving our athletes the power of support by recording a brand new version of their anthem, Jerusalem. To listen to the track visit npower.com/teamengland