DWAIN CHAMBERS won the 100 metres in the inaugural European Team Championships in Leiria, Portugal, in a time of 10.07 seconds to put the Great Britain team in a good position after the first day’s competition.

Despite a slow start, Chambers, who was banned from athletics for two years for taking drugs and has since attracted controversy whenever he has taken to his blocks, quickly got into his powerful stride and assumed control of the race at the halfway stage to easily beat Italy’s Emanuele Di Gregorio and Frenchman Martial Mbandjock.

Elsewhere, Tim Benjamin, determined to regain the form over 400 metres that had hinted he could challenge the world’s best over one lap, raced to victory with a display that suggested that if he can avoid the injuries that have put his career on hold for three years, the future could once again be bright.

The 27-year-old Welshman fought neck-and-neck down the home straight with Sweden’s Olympic finalist Johan Wissman before pulling ahead in the final 10 metres to win by 0.24secs in a time of 45.57s. “I just wanted to win this for the team,” he said.

Further British team victories came from Dai Greene, who won the 400 metres hurdles, and Emily Freeman in the short sprint. Greene, the 23-year-old from Llandelli, competing in his senior debut, ran an assured race to win in 49.26 seconds, while Freeman, a late replacement for first-choice Ashlee Nelson, took the women’s 100m in 11.42 seconds, defeating Ukraine’s Nataliya Pohrebnyak and Marika Popowicz of Poland into second and third respectively.