Father-figure Christie helps guide Kounta to European silver

Under the wing of father-figure Linford Christie, France's Muhammad Abdallah Kounta has rebounded from a controversial six-month ban to claim a 400m silver medal at the European championships in Birmingham.

Hometown favourite and European record holder Matthew Hudson-Smith triumphed on the Alexander Stadium where he has trained since childhood.

Kounta was just 0.23sec off his winning time of 44.17, a career second fastest time after setting a personal best in the semi-finals.

"I'm coming back from a very long way, people don't know how hard it's been," said Kounta.

Kounta was suspended for six months by the French Athletics Federation after the 2024 Paris Olympics for having posted and shared on social networks comments inciting hatred, notably against Israel.

"The people who know me support me, I received backing from people in the French team who told me, 'We know you're not like that', and that gave me a lot of comfort," he said.

Kounta was again quick to apologise "to the people who misunderstood what I said. I simply supported the Palestinian people".

"I'm very proud to represent my country, France, and when I wear this jersey I think it shows."

Kounta began the summer with a personal best of 45.12sec, but acknowledges that he has thrived on a season without injury and a more professional approach than in the past.

"Before, people knew me as the grafter, the crazy guy shouting in training, throwing up after every session," he said.

"Now I've learned to listen to my body, to know when to ease off."

Kounta has been coached since 2021 by British sprint star Linford Christie, the former Olympic champion (1992), world champion (1993) and triple European champion (1989, 1992, 1994) over 100m.

"He was there for me in very difficult times, in years when I was at rock bottom," said Kounta. "I lost my father, I wanted to quit athletics."

He maintains he knew nothing of Christie's record and stature before starting to train with him.

"Linford is not like a coach for me, he's more like my dad," Kounta said.

"He is a sprinting legend and has done so much for me and I cannot thank him enough."

Christie, he said, had not given him a race plan.

"He just told me to run how I normally do and that helped me relax. I'm pleased with how I executed that race.

"I knew that Matt was in the lane outside me and that he would go out fast. But I tried to ignore that and just focus on my own race and run to my own strengths.

"I have improved a lot this year. I am stronger going through the rounds. I ran a personal best yesterday but felt I had the strength to replicate that today, which is something I don't think I could have done in previous years."

Kounta said his first individual international medal had given him confidence.

"I want to take this into next year, starting with the indoors where I won my first medal in the relay. I'm a lot stronger now so we will see what happens," he said.

"I came for gold so I was disappointed at first. Now we've got silver, we're not going to mope, we're going to celebrate this!"