A bitter-sounding Omar McLeod said he is heartbroken after not being given an opportunity to defend his Olympic title in Tokyo later this month and has described as absurd, the Jamaica Athletic Administrative Association’s (JAAA) decision to exclude from the country’s Olympic team.

The 27-year-old McLeod was speaking today at a press conference on the eve of the Gateshead Diamond League meeting on Tuesday.

The 2016 Olympic champion hit the first hurdle at his country’s national championships on Sunday, June 27 and finished eighth. He complained afterwards that he had suffered a cramp after being forced to run the finals on Sunday morning having won his semi-final on the night before in 13.04 his second-fastest time this season.

Ronald Levy, who was second in McLeod’s semi-final in a season-best 13.08, won the final in 13.10 ahead of Damion Thomas (13.11) and Hansle Parchment (13.16), all top 10 times in the world. However, the national record holder felt he should have been considered for selection, despite the competition rules which state that the first three places will be selected.

Asked about his situation, McLeod held nothing back.

“I am very heartbroken, honestly. I don’t think I was given or granted a fair opportunity to make the team with this ridiculous schedule that I have never seen in my years in track and field where they have semi-finals late in the evening and then, without recovery and the country was in complete lockdown so we were unable to go back to the hotel and get food,” he lamented, his voice near the point of breaking.

“So, my team and I, we did the best we could and we went to a little lounge at the hotel and drank some soup and had a salad because that was all they had, trying to go back to the track and five in the morning for a final at eight, I mean, that’s stupid.

“For an event that has your reigning Olympic champion, you don’t treat the event like that. Give me a fair opportunity like everybody else to come and make the team. I didn’t have the audacity to not show up at the trials thinking I was obligated to make the team. I went there ready to compete and earn my spot.”

He said on the morning of the race he suffered a severe cramp and thought that his country would have ‘had my back."

“We did a medical exemption. It’s been done for Usain Bolt and other athletes before where they couldn’t run in the final or something happened. I was in the same position where I won all the major gold medals and historic moments where I was the first Jamaican to win (110mh) gold medals in every championship so I thought I was going to be okay.”

McLeod said his team exhausted every possible avenue of appeal including sending emails and meeting with the members of the selection committee. He also put out a statement on social media explaining what happened prior to the race.

The distraught sprint hurdler, who said he was denied the chance to run ‘something ridiculous’ at the trials, perhaps a national or world record, suggested he doesn’t know what he will do at the meet on Tuesday as he will be running on pure emotion waiting for the season to end.

“To be denied the opportunity is really absurd,” he said.

Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce is hopeful she will improve on her 200m lifetime best when she competes at the Diamond League’s Herculis meet in Monaco where she goes up against Shaunae Miller-Uibo and Marie Josee Ta Lou on Friday.

Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce is set to make her first appearance in a Diamond League race in Oslo on July 1.

Omar McLeod said he is having fun again as he once more signalled his intent to successfully defend his Olympic title with a world-leading 13.01, to win the 110-metres hurdles at the Diamond League meeting in Florence, Italy.

Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce clocked a season-best 10.84 to record her first win over 100m at the Diamond League meeting in Doha today.

Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce said her priority for this summer’s Olympic Games in Tokyo, Japan is running faster than 10.70 in the 100m but indicates that it would be nice to be on the podium with a medal and the time she is so passionately in pursuit of.

Jamaica’s Shanieka Ricketts was the only winner from the Caribbean at Sunday’s Diamond League meeting in Gateshead where Dina Asher-Smith upstaged Sha Carri Richardson and Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce.

Ricketts, the 2019 World Championships triple silver medalist jumped out to 14.40m to take gold. It was close thing with Portugal’s Patricia Mamoa, who jumped a season-best 14.37m for second place. Naomi Ogbeta of Great Britain got a season-best 14.29m for third.

Afterwards, Ricketts said the conditions were difficult to deal with.

 “It was brutal. I am just so happy I didn't end up injured. It was really hard to focus on technical things and not very conducive to getting good jumps. I just wanted to get myself into the position to have an extra jump and then the only thing that mattered was to get the best jump,” she said while revealing that she is not yet sold on the final-three concept.

“I was a bit sceptical but it is something we need to get used to.”

There were also second-place finishes for Trinidad and Tobago’s Keshorn Walcott, the 2012 Olympic champion, Danniel Thomas-Dodd, and Stephenie-Ann McPherson in the javelin, shot put and 400m, respectively.

Walcott, who was also the bronze medalist at Rio 2016, threw 77.78m, to take the runner-up spot as Poland’s Marcin Krukowski defied the wind and rain to throw 82.61m. He was the only thrower over 80m.

Sweden’s Kim Amb was third with a heave of 76.96m.

Thomas-Dodd just lost out to Portugal’s Auriol Dongmo, who threw 19.08m in the shot put to advance to the final round. Thomas-Dodd, whose best effort was 18.46 also advanced along with the USA’s Maggie Ewen who put 18.54m.

However, in the final round where the previous throws were cancelled, Thomas-Dodd threw 18.12m that was bettered by 18.16m from the Cameroon transfer.  Ewen threw 16.96m for third.

Thomas-Dodd, who said she expected a better showing, vented her frustrations afterwards.

“It's a little bit frustrating because I've been working on a lot of things with my technique which I'm still trying to get in competition. I had some really nice throws today but I wasn’t able to stay in the ring so that's just one of the things I need to go back to the drawing board and work on,” she declared, adding that she would use the conditions as an excuse for her performance.

“That's all I can hope for (to refine technique and to come good at the right time). I know with the time I have it's about fine-tuning those little things. I never complain about conditions because you never know what you'll get wherever you go, so you have to be mentally prepared for whatever conditions you get on the day. You have to work with what you can control and that's being in the ring and working with your technique.”

McPherson produced a strong finish but ran out of real estate to finish second in 400m won by the USA’s Kendall Ellis in 51.86. McPherson clocked 51.96 while holding off Lieke Klaver of the Netherlands was third in a season-best 52.03.

Janieve Russell was beaten into third place in the 400m hurdles by Denmark’s Sara Slott Petersen and Great Britain’s Jessica Turner, who clocked 56.32 and 56.56, respectively.

Tajay Gayle had to settle for third place in the long jump when he was unable to soar beyond 8.14m in the final round where his preliminary round jump of 8.00m was of no consequence except that it got him into the final.

There, Italy’s Phillippo Randazza leapt out to 8.11m to win over Eusebio Caceres, who got 8.04m on his final jump. Gayle could only muster 7.91m which got him third.