Athletics: England's golden night on the track

Holmes, Hansen, Backley and Campbell inspired by euphoric atmosphere to claim emotional wins

Even the Albert Hall can not have witnessed as many successive renditions of Land of Hope and Glory as the City of Manchester Stadium did last night after a climactic session of Commonwealth athletics that yielded six gold medals for the host nation and created an enduring memory for the domestic sport to set alongside Sunday night's heroics by Paula Radcliffe, Jonathan Edwards and Mick Jones. A memory which will last much longer, sadly, than the surface on which all the action took place, which will now be removed to accommodate Manchester City FC.

They call these the Friendly Games, but for four of the English gold medallists who helped their nation top the final medal tally with 29, one more than Australia, they may as well have been called the Redemption Games.

Kelly Holmes, in the 1500 metres, Ashia Hansen, in the triple jump, Steve Backley in the javelin and Darren Campbell, anchoring the 4x100m relay team, have all experienced switchback fortunes in recent years. And as a capacity 38,000 crowd rose to them in turn, a large part of the warmth and volume of the acclaim had to do with the way each had come through against the odds to prompt re-enactments of the Last Night of the Proms.

The action concluded with two more English golds. First Michael East ran away from the Kenyans to produce an unexpected victory in the 1500m and then the 400m relay team took the final event by the one hundredth of a second that separated anchor leg runner Daniel Caines, who missed an individual medal by a similar fraction this week, from Wales' 400m hurdler Matt Elias. In a final dramatic turn, Elias ­ he of the pink Mohican ­ was reduced from an exuberantly leaping figure to a disconsolate mess as the long wait for a result was ended by the announcer's words: "First place goes to... England." It was the story of the night.

Rewards of different hue also rained in for the host nation on an evening when the elements, thankfully, remained kind. The women's 400m relay team earned silver behind an Australian team which included the Olympic gold medallist Cathy Freeman. Bronze went to the women's sprint relay team, Helen Pattinson ­ who saw Wales' Hayley Tullett pass her on the line for silver in the 1500m ­ and Carl Myerscough, who managed 19.91m in a shot put won by Australia's Justin Anlezark in a Games record of 20.91.

Holmes got the celebrations underway with a characteristically determined drive for home over the final lap which eventually freed her from a field which included the Kenyan who beat her to this title four years ago, Jackline Maranga.

As the finishing line loomed up in front of her, the grimace of effort on Holmes' face was already beginning to change into something radiant. By the time she crossed the line to regain the title she won eight years ago in Victoria the smile could not have been broader as she raised both arms in the air and shouted out one word: "Yes."

The deepening roar of acclaim Holmes earned as she opened up a telling 10 metres lead over her team-mate Pattinson and Wales' Tullett was comparable with the storm of emotion that had thundered through the stadium three days' earlier when Radcliffe had finally attained her first major international track title after 10 years of trying.

This may not have been the first gold medal of Holmes' career, but it was just as precious as the one the 32-year-old Kent athlete had earned in 1994 before her career was disrupted by the injuries that wrecked her Olympic and world ambitions.

Given her troubled history, an Olympic bronze in Sydney two years ago was worth gold to Holmes, but she collected another actual winner's prize after twice glancing behind her in the finishing straight, as if she could not quite trust what was happening.

"I was petrified to go out training in the last few days in case I injured myself again," Holmes said, after finishing 10 metres clear in 4min 5.99sec. "I'm so grateful to have come through in one piece."

Soon afterwards there was another emotional win for an English woman athlete as Ashia Hansen saw her triple jump lead taken away with the penultimate effort of the competition, 14.82m by Cameroon's Françoise Mbango, only to respond with her own concluding jump of 14.86sec.

"I wanted it even more because Françoise was waving to the crowd thinking she had won it," Hansen said, after roaring out of the pit and celebrating like a crazy thing. "I heard the crowd on the runway, and then I went onto auto-pilot. Everything just fell into place."

Backley who endured the disappointment of failing to reach last year's World Championships, found things falling into place a little earlier as he achieved his third Commonwealth title with a trademark ­ the mighty first-round effort. His throw of 86.81m proved sufficient to regain a title he lost to South Africa's Marius Corbett four years ago.

Campbell, born two miles from the stadium in Moss Side, was given the last leg run in the sprint relay in the absence of the injured Dwain Chambers and rounded off his Games by edging out Jamaica's Asafa Powell on the line. As with his 200m bronze medal, he got the decision despite being credited with the same time ­ in this case 38.62sec.

Having spoken of injury problems and personal troubles that saw him contemplate suicide at Christmas, Campbell, flagbearer for the England team, could hardly have had a more emotionally fulfiling week in his life.

The Welsh 400m relay runners, including a tearful Iwan Thomas, may have seen their final flourish frustrated, but they ended their night on a jubilant note with a slapstick tumbling routine after the medal ceremony. Laughter after the tears, and a fitting end to this part of the XVII Friendly Games.