David Gillick's hopes of European Championship glory were ended on Friday as he could only finish fifth in the final of the 400metres at Barcelona's Olympic Stadium.

Gillick, who had looked so impressive in the previous two rounds, crossed the line in 45.28seconds as Belgium's Kevin Borlee took the gold 45.08secs.

"I'm absolutely gutted," he said. "That was my race, my chance to get on the podium, all the sort of stuff. It was an absolute mess of a race, I never got into a rhythm, I was maybe a fraction sluggish out of the blocks, was a little bit all over the place coming round the bend."

He added: "Everyone was together, it was so close. Maybe if I had five more metres I might have just nipped in, I was 0.05s away from a medal but within that there were, I think, five other guys. It's a 400m not 405m.

"I'm getting frustrated now. I've been so close...so close. You put so much in I just don't see that I got any of it back there for myself."

There was also disappointment for Paul Hession, who was sixth in the 200m final in 20.71 as France's Christophe Lemaitre completed the sprint double.

Paul Henderson set a new Irish record in the 50km walk but had to settle for his second fourth-placed finish of the championships. Henderson, who was also fourth in the 20km walk, completed the course in three hours 45.30 minutes, just under five minutes behind winner Yohann Diniz of France. Ireland's other representative in the event, Colin Griffin, was 11th.

Derval O'Rourke, who took European silver in Gothenburg four years ago, qualified with ease for the semi-finals of the 100m hurdles, winning her heat in a season's best of 12.88.

Fionnuala Britton was 11th in the 3000m steeplechase final.

Niamh Whelan made it to the 200m semi-finals where she could only manage sixth in 23.31, while Deirdre Ryan failed to make it past high jump qualifying, a season's best of 1.90m not enough to take her into the final.