Paris 2024: Seventh for Liam Jegou in canoe slalom final

Liam Jegou finished seventh in the men's canoe slalom single final after an impressive showing had the 28-year-old threatening for a medal at the Vaires-sur-Marne Nautical Centre.

The Team Ireland athlete described Saturday's gruelling day of action as "probably the hardest day I've had on the water in my life" but was in excellent form in today's semi-final.

A time of 98.52 meant he was sixth fastest of the dozen that progressed to the final, with world number three Nicolas Gestin posting the quickest time overall.

Jegou gave another assured performance when the final got underway shortly after, but an error at gate 14 proved costly.

We need your consent to load this comcast-player content We use comcast-player to manage extra content that can set cookies on your device and collect data about your activity. Please review their details and accept them to load the content. Manage Preferences

Those two penalty seconds meant he replicated his time earlier in the day, and while 98.52 had him temporarily in the bronze position, it was never going to be enough with the five fastest semi-finalists yet to hit the water.

A clean run, without those two second penalties, would have been good enough for silver.

Jegou said his performance in the final was what he had "been working towards for the past 15 years".

He told RTÉ Sport: "I had a blast today, we spoke two days ago and I was ready to retire, maybe not that far but today was brilliant.

"I put down a really great semi-final run to qualify for the first final in a while, and that final was superb."

"It's what I’ve been looking for for years, years, years and I got it at the right moment. I can stand here and talk about the 'what ifs' and this and that but the fact is, two days ago I