I’m Eur man to lead us on

NEIL GOURLEY wants to serve up some european glory tonight and then ask Scotland’s footballers to follow his lead.

The 29-year-old Glaswegian is primed for a medal shot in the men’s 1500metres final in Rome. Gourley, who regularly gets up at dawn at his American base to watch Rangers online, admits he’d love to be jetting on to Germany rather than preparing for this month’s Olympic trials. But he’s giving himself more of a chance than Steve Clarke’s men and he won’t let their fortunes weigh down his Paris quest. The Scot said: “I’ve been let down by Scotland in the past between rugby and football. It is hopefully turning a little bit on the football side but we’ll see. But I try to keep those things quite separate because what I’m trying to do is really have a world class level – and it is so different from a team sport. “I kind of wish when things went well, I could celebrate with team-mates. “But it’s such an individual sport that it just feels so different. “It’s hard to be inspired by what the team are doing. I just treat it separately.” In Gourley’s way stands defending champion Jakob Ingebrigtsen, who will hunt a Euro double following his 5000m win last weekend. Defending European champion Keely Hodgkinson breezed into tonight’s women’s 800m final in Rome by winning her semi-final in 1:58.07. However, Gourley’s Giffnock club-mate Erin Wallace missed out by a single place, coming sixth in 1:59.89 – her third fastest ever time. “I gave it my best shot but got stuck in a few places,” she said.