As Mo Farah was presented with another world championships gold medal in Beijing yesterday, back home in England, Andy Vernon was watching and fuming.
In August last year, Vernon stood alongside Farah on the podium at the European championships in Zurich after both the 10,000 metres and 5,000 metres finals. Since then the two have fallen out badly and it is Farah who Vernon seems to be blaming for the decision not to select him for the Great Britain team for Beijing.
Neil Black, the Great Britain performance director, insists that the decision not to take Vernon was purely based on his form. But Vernon does not seem to believe that, as he made all too clear in a tweet after Farah was interviewed by BBC television after being presented with his gold medal for the 10,000 metres yesterday.
“Well done on your medal @Mo_Farah. Great to hear you love your country. Thank you for stopping me do the same. Good luck for 5K,” the tweet said.
Their row first came to public knowledge in February on Twitter, after which Farah said he had been offended by a remark Vernon had made in Zurich, jokingly claiming to be the first European-born home in their race. Vernon tried to apologise, but Farah was having none of it. When Vernon went to shake Farah’s hand after finishing down the field behind him in at the Diamond League meeting in Lausanne last month, Farah told him to “f*** off”.
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The stick has become water off a duck’s back to Farah but the longer the row continues, the one who is suffering is Vernon.
Certainly Farah had no thoughts about his former team-mate yesterday as he accepted his gold medal — nor did he appear to be aware that the Union Jack was hung upside down during the presentation ceremony, a mistake spotted by observant BBC television viewers. His focus is to prepare for his attempt at another piece of history in the 5,000 metres, the heats of which take place on Wednesday.
Farah described Saturday’s win in the 10,000 metres as the hardest of his six global distance finals, after his three Kenyan rivals tried to break Farah. But even a final-lap trip over Geoffrey Kamworor, his rival, could not stop him as he maintained his lead over the last 600 metres.
“It’s doable,” Farah said when asked if he could achieve another distance double. “It’s important that I have three days to look after myself and to try and recover. I got back late by the time I got through doping and had a massage, so went to bed about 12.30. I was all right when I woke up in the morning.”
Farah is expecting the four Kenyans in the 5,000 metres to race as a team. “It could be a fast one,” he said. “They will be thinking ‘Mo will be tired from the ten’ or it could come down to the last six or seven laps, I honestly don’t know. It would be easier if they just sat back and wait until there are two laps to go, but I don’t think it is going to come to that.”
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Farah runs alone, and as he has shown so often, he doesn’t need a team-mate.