The deep disappointment that followed the Irish athletes out of the Sydney Olympics surfaced again as the team left Edmonton yesterday. A claim on a medal here was always dependant on miracles, but without a single finalist and enough bad luck stories to start a charity, the same hard questions that hit the sport a year ago are suddenly being retold.

With the obvious exception of Sonia O'Sullivan, the post-Sydney analysis painted a grim picture of the sport in Ireland and suggestions on what's going wrong came from all directions. But a year later, the feeling is that the overall performance in Edmonton took a step back rather than a step forward.

Competing on the world stage of athletics continues to get more difficult. Edmonton may have failed to deliver a world record, but it delivered on everything else. As the crowds grew throughout the week, championship records fell in a range of events from the men's pole vault to the women's javelin. Distance races on the track have never been more memorable.

In the end a total of 55 nations managed to place; that is, finish in the top eight in any of the 46 events. Ireland's highest placings came in the women's and men's 20km walk, where Olive Loughnane came home 13th of the 27 finishers and Robert Heffernan 14th of the 24 finishers.

Two new national records, from Sarah Reilly in the 200 metres and the men's 4x400 metres relay, provided some positive spin on the Irish reports, but their impression on the events was minimal. Reilly ended up 20th of the 24 semi-finalists and the relay team was ranked 18th of the 21 entries.

The likes of Karen Shinkins in the 400 metres and Peter Coghlan in the 110 metre hurdles performed as well as expected to progress from the first round, but the hopes of surpassing expectations quickly faded afterwards. Coghlan wasn't helped by a false start that was later corrected as legal. He is still finding it hard to reproduce the encouraging times he clocked two seasons ago.

Topping the list of disappointments were Mark Carroll and James Nolan. After promising so much in the summer Grand Prix races, Carroll ran like a headless chicken in the heats of the 5,000 metres and he was the first to admit his disgust afterwards. "I couldn't get into a rhythm and I just didn't feel that good out there," he said.

The last thing Nolan was told by his coach Brendan Hackett before the heats of the 1,500 metres was not to take the lead under any circumstances. Less than 100 metres into the race Nolan was in front, and continued to lead until he died a rapid death on the last lap.

"All he could say afterwards was that he was sorry," said Hackett. "He realised his mistake but he didn't quite understand why he did it."

Carroll and Nolan train extremely hard and prepare like the fully-professional athletes they are. Like Hackett, Carroll's coach Jimmy Harvey has studied the sport deeply, so both of them are carefully advised.

To see two athletes with such extensive experience run so naively defies an easy explanation.

Just a few moments at the warm-up track offers a couple of hints of how the Irish preparations differ. Successful nations like Ethiopia or Kenya or the American sprinters are all seen warming-up together and sharing tactics.

Then the Irish athletes walk in, invariably alone and without much evidence of any team spirit. Carroll and Nolan are both class distance runners but they have never trained together or even shared tactical advice. Even at this stage in their careers, they both have a lot to offer each other.

Breda Dennehy-Willis, who missed out on a place in the 5,000 metres final, was among those to call for better team spirit among Irish distance runners: "Do we go on training camps, or altitude training?" she said. "You look at the Russians and they put huge money into organising coaching and training camps. They've had the success here and it hasn't been all to do with the drugs."

Paddy Marley, Ireland's team manager in Edmonton, praised the facilities and organisation and did everything right to ensure the proper administration of the Irish competitors.

The real problems are embedded in the system at home, where Athletics Ireland remains unimaginative and largely stagnant in their plans for a national coach. Like so many other sports, it may be time to look overseas, at Africa or Australia, to find the people necessary to get Irish athletics back on track.

Canada, despite heavy funding, also failed to win any medals here, and coach Les Gramantik gave his views on the reason why.

"Some athletes may disagree, but as a national programme you need to have solid strong leadership, the direction that leads us somewhere in four years."

Irish athletics has done well in getting the money, but it's still got problems getting that leadership.