Our greatest Games: Mo Farah’s double double caps golden Olympics for Britain – but how did we do it? – Telegraph.co.uk

Mr England said: “We always said we were taking away our most talented team and it wasn’t just rhetoric. I genuinely believed it. I was also pretty confident we would make history and be the most successful team we have ever taken away from home, and it hasn’t just been about the medals, it’s been about millions of people screaming at their televisions, whether they were watching Mo Farah, the Brownlees, Adam Peaty, the list just goes on.”

Britain’s turnaround in fortunes over the past 20 years has had other countries scrambling to catch up. In 1996, the team won just 15 medals, including a solitary gold, as dedicated amateurs took on the full-time athletes of Russia, China and the USA. Team GB finished 36th in the medal table that year.

But in 1997, the National Lottery started funding athletes so they could train full-time and, by 2004, the medal tally had doubled to 30, doubling again at London 2012 to 65.