Katarina Johnson-Thompson dismisses injury fears after Belgrade withdrawal

Katarina Johnson-Thompson dismissed any injury fears and vowed she will get stronger after pulling out of the World Indoor Championships.

The defending pentathlon champion returned for the first time since her Olympic heartbreak in Tokyo last summer.

She suffered a calf injury in the 200m before withdrawing from the heptathlon in Japan – having beaten the odds to make it after rupturing her Achilles in December 2020.

She was a late entry into the British team having won the title in Birmingham in 2018.

The 29-year-old endured a rusty morning in Belgrade and was never in medal contention but insisted she will improve ahead of the defence of her world and Commonwealth titles this year.

“I’m fit and I’m happy, but I knew I couldn’t give it my all for the 800m so I’ve decided to withdraw from the last event in the pentathlon,” she said.

This was my first opportunity to compete since Tokyo and I wanted to test myself in a competition again- Katarina Johnson-Thompson

“This was my first opportunity to compete since Tokyo and I wanted to test myself in a competition again.

“I came out here and I was super rusty but when you think about my career over the last two years, with COVID and the Achilles rupture, you can count them out to competitions I’ve done on one hand so I can take so many positives.

“I’ve learned a lot. I’ve now got a plan in place for the rest of the season and I’m now really excited to get back out there and defend my titles.

“I have three championships the target, I think I’m only going to do two of them. My ultimate goal is to do the Worlds in Eugene and then the Commonwealth Games being the other.”

In the morning session Johnson-Thompson showed she still needed to get up to speed as she ran 8.45seconds in