Magnificent performance by Natalya Coyle

As the final member of Team Ireland into Olympic action on Sunday, Natalya Coyle produced the best performance of her career to defy her world ranking of 35th to claim a superb ninth place finish in the Modern Pentathlon at Greenwich. It was a day of personal and seasons bests for the 21-year-old Tara woman as she concluded a gruelling 11-hours of action across five events with a superb final run in the Combined Running/Shooting to improve from 11th to ninth in the closing stages. "This is hard to believe, four years ago I never dreamt I could even be in the Olympics. I started the day ranked somewhere like 28th or 29th, but to have personal bests and season's best and then finish ninth, I can't really get my head around it," said a delighted Coyle. "For some reason I wasn't at all nervous, I was really calm the whole day. It has been a long wait, but hopefully I've made everyone proud and seen out the games with a bang," she concluded. Coyle finished the opening fencing event in a tie for 11th with Britain's world champion Mhairi Spence, who eventually finished 21st. From there she produced a new PB of 2:19.17 in the 200m swim and moved from 15th overall to 11th with a superb round in the showjumping. The combined event saw Coyle complete the 3000m course and three rounds of shooting in an outstanding time as she moved up two places to claim her remarkable ninth place finish.