Britain will not have a women's 4x100 metres relay team at the London 2012 after they were disqualified from the European Championships.
The quartet of Anyika Onuora, Montell Douglas, Hayley Jones and Ashleigh Nelson ran 43.51 seconds to finish second to Germany in their semi-final - only to be disqualified for a lane infringement.
Jones was adjudged to have stepped outside her lane on the third leg around the bend.
This means the team have dropped to 17th in the world rankings with only the top 16 nations qualifying for the Games.
UK Athletics head coach Charles van Commenee told reporters in Helsinki: "We have been under performing in this area for more than 10 years and at one point you don't get away with it."
"I'm not really surprised, that's why I stopped the programme basically two years ago. I decided after Barcelona not to support the female relay athletes financially any longer because I didn't think they were going to be dangerous in London."
"It's a disappointment but at the same time I did not expect great things at all. I think it's a true reflection of where we are. We are not a top-eight nation in that area."
Van Commenee famously labelled the women's relay squad a "disgrace" for their "schoolgirl mistakes" at the 2011 European Championships in Barcelona in March where they failed to get the baton around safely.
In contrast, the men's team of Christian Malcolm, Dwain Chambers, James Ellington and Mark Lewis-Francis qualified fastest for their final with a time of 38.98 seconds.
