STUNNED MO SIGNS OFF WITH SILVER AT WORLDS

No fairytale ending as Sir Mo misses out on gold in final track race

SIR MO FARAH suffered a knight-mare as he narrowly lost a global championship final for the first time in six years.

On the London track where he had never been beaten, in front of a raucous sell-out crowd, the British star could only finish second to Ethiopian Muktar Edris.

Farah gave everything on the final lap, but a spring breakaway by Ethiopian pair Yomif Kejelcha and Edris proved just too much for him.

Not for a second had anyone in the London Stadium contemplated Farah, the winner of six World titles, failing to complete a magnificent seventh.

But, just as Usain Bolt had failed to sign off with the individual gold his fairytale storyline demanded, so Farah stumbled at the last.

The clues were out there, if he had looked for them.

Sir Don Bradman, the greatest batsmen of them all, finished with a second ball duck at The Oval when four runs would have given him a career Test average of 100 – rather than 99.94.

Martin Johnson – England’s World Cup-winning rugby captain – ended his career with a heavy defeat at Twickenham, his Leicester team well beaten 39-14 by Wasps in the 2005 Premiership Final.

The incomparable Muhammad Ali, looking a shadow of his former self, was pummelled into retirement by Trevor Berbick in the Bahamas in 1981.

Even Michael Jordan, basketball’s gravity-defying superstar, stayed too long.

He could – no, should

– have left us with untarnished memories of his time with the Bulls of Chicago.

Instead, we recall his illstarred comeback with the Washington Wizards at the age of 38.

Farah, to be fair, was still in peak shape, even at the age of 34.

Nine successive global titles coming into London told us that, and No.10 – his 10,000m triumph on day one of the championships – was arguably the best of them all.

But the following night Bolt (above) was stripped of his untouchable tag by Justin Gatlin and maybe, just maybe, the sight of his great friend being knocked off his perch made Farah aware of his own sporting mortality.

Perhaps, just perhaps, it had the same unsettling effect a tightrope walker experiences when he looks down.

Whatever the truth, Farah was unable to do what he had in Daegu, Moscow and Beijing at the last three World Championships dating back to 2011.

He could not stretch away as he had in South Korea when beating Bernard Lagat to win his first global gold.

The absolute certainty he displayed in Moscow, two years later, was absent too. As for the last lap tear-up he produced in Beijing to break that field, well evidently there was no repeat performance.

These have been the championships of the unexpected, what with Jamaica failing to win a title in either men’s or women’s sprints and Kenya’s women stripped of their usual golden touch.

But this was the biggest upset of them all.

Nobody thought Farah would lose, you could see it in the eyes of his opponents.

Like the young sprinters with Bolt, they had grown up with two certainties.

Night follows day and the rest of the world follows Farah.

Not last night.

At the end, he took the applause of fans that Bolt is on record as rating the best in all of athletics.

One last time he walked around the track where so many of his dreams reside – from his 2012 Olympic double to that wonderful 10k triumph eight days.

In time, this memory will fade and the glory nights will come back into focus.

Just not yet.

THAT’S ALL FOLKS: Farah has to settle for a silver in his final major event