Defiant Campbell hits back

The 30-year-old sprinter said winning the 4x100m relay was the pinnacle of his career, and admitted he could struggle for motivation in the future.

"I just want to go home now, and relax and really assess what I want to do, whether I'm going to continue or just knock it on the head," he said.

"To have Olympic gold is everything I ever dreamt since I was a small child. It was all I wanted from the sport."

Campbell said the negative press coverage about the British sprinters - none of whom made either the 100m or 200m final - had hurt.

"My future depends on whether I can motivate myself to train, because the last few weeks have been really trying and it has really tested my character to be honest.

"But the public support has been immense and if anything's going to bring me back out, it's going to be that."

Speaking of the race - which saw Britain win their first sprint relay gold since 1912 - Campbell hailed the team spirit which took him, Jason Gardener, Marlon Devonish and Mark Lewis-Francis to gold.

"We're just in shock, all four of us," he said.

"Going into the race we'd been slated in all corners but that drew us closer together as individuals and a team.

"After not having the greatest championships, we achieved something totally amazing.

"We had so much team spirit and belief that we said before the race 'we can win this'. We put them under pressure, they made a mistake and we won."