Irish fail to progress in Eindhoven

Swimming : There was to be no fairytale stories for the triumvirate of Irish swimmers in the women's 100 metres freestyle at the European championships this morning.

Melanie Nocher, Aisling Cooney and Clare Dawson all failed to progress to this evening's finals, with Dawson leading the Irish in a time of 58.70 seconds that was still some margin outside of what was required.

In front of their home crowd in Eindhoven, the Dutch women continued to show awesome form after breaking the 4x100 metres freestyle relay world record last night.

They filled four of the top five slots in the heats but only the two fastest from any nation can progress to the semi-finals.

World silver medallist Marleen Veldhuis, who swam the fastest-ever women's relay split of 52.62 seconds yesterday, led the way in 53.77.

Elsewhere, ailing triple Olympic gold medallist Pieter van den Hoogenband was eliminated in the 200 metres freestyle heats.

Van den Hoogenband had led through the first 100 metres from equally seasoned 2000 European champion Massimiliano Rosolino.

But the 29-year-old Italian cut loose on the third length of the 50-metre the National Swimming Centre pool as Van den Hoogenband slid down the order to touch sixth in one minute 49.99 seconds for 20th place overall.