Disappointment for Clancy as GB struggle in Cali

Varnish and James claimed third in the women’s team sprint to rescue a poor day for Britain, the dominant track nation for some time, after the men’s team pursuit and team sprint squads failed to advance to their respective medal ride-offs.

Clancy, Sam Harrison, Owain Doull and Jon Dibben finished a lowly eighth - Britain’s worst result in at least 15 years - in the four-man, four-kilometre event.

The 28-year-old Barnsley-born rider - a winner of four world titles and two Olympic golds in the team pursuit - said: “We didn’t announce it on Twitter, but behind the scenes we’ve had some problems.

“We knew a week ago our back was against the wall. (But) despite the fact we didn’t have a couple of our more established riders in the line-up, we were still hoping to get a ride in the final.

“That’s sport. Some days you go better than you think, other days you don’t go quite so well. We have tried a bit of a different approach for these track worlds. Perhaps it just hasn’t paid off.

“It’s like a stack of cards - if one part falls down it all comes tumbling down pretty quickly.

“There wasn’t one of us that was really on fire. We’ve got nothing to lose and everything to gain. We can still get some medals yet.”

And London 2012 champions Phil Hindes and Jason Kenny combined with Kian Emadi to place fifth in the three-man, three-lap team pursuit.

Kenny has twice won Olympic gold in the event, but never the world champion’s rainbow jersey and Britain’s wait for a men’s team sprint world title will extend to 10 years at least.

Britain have not won the world title since 2005 - when Sir Chris Hoy, in Cali as a team mentor, was part of the squad - and for a third successive year they have now missed out on a medal.

Kenny, who will bid to defend his Keirin title on day two, tried to accentuate the positive after the 43.617 seconds ride.

“It is frustrating for me,” the 25-year-old from Bolton said.

“I’ve got a lot of medals in this event over the years, not many of them gold. We’ve got the Olympic gold medals, which is the main ones.

“We’ve got the potential to dominate, or certainly to be competitive every time we go out and that’s where I’d like to be really.

“We’re disappointed with the result, but the time itself and the way we rode wasn’t that bad.

“We’ve got a lot closer to the lead than we have been. The New Zealand guys were out in front by a little bit of a margin, but everyone else was quite tight.

“It’s just unfortunate everyone is so tight and we just slipped out the second ride.”

In the corresponding women’s event, Varnish and James won the ride-off for bronze ahead of Russia, clocking 33.032.

“It was a solid performance tonight,” Varnish said.

“It’s a really different track to what we’ve ridden on and you can’t really compare it to other performances. I think we should be happy.

“It’s a really good start.”