HANNAH ENGLAND has set her sights on ruffling the feathers of the world’s best after avoiding a potential banana skin in Daegu.

Yesterday’s morning session proved to be a tough few hours for the British team with five of the seven girls in action bowing out in their first heats in the Far East.

Top of that list was reigning world silver medallist and 1500m teammate Lisa Dobriskey, but England made sure she broke the mould in comfortably qualifying for the semi-finals.

England – who won the Aviva World Trials and UK Championships to book her spot in Daegu – strolled to victory in her heat to lay down an impressive marker ahead of tomorrow’s semi-final.

But the 24-year-old admits she’ll need to turn it up a notch – in terms of both her self-belief and her times.

“On paper looking at the qualifying requirements with the top six I thought ‘oh, that should be fine’,” said England.

“But then when the start lists come out you think ‘oh dear’ and you start looking at all these names.

“But I have got to stop putting these girls ahead of me and make sure I put myself with them.”

Despite winning her heat, England’s time of 4mins 13.45secs was only 19th quickest overall.

But the ease with which she stamped her authority on the race in the latter stages, plus a near two-day break until the semi-finals, means England is feeling bullish about her chances of progressing.

“I felt really good, you always feel nervous when you are warming up because you think. ‘I haven’t raced for a while, so I might feel awful’.

“Hopefully, it hasn’t taken too much out of me ahead of the semi-finals, it didn’t feel like it did and we’ve got a day-and-a-half to put my feet up.

“I didn’t realise I had run a 59-second last lap. I didn’t want to kick too early, but there were so many people on the back straight that I thought that I had got to get ahead of some of those people.

“I wanted to make myself an obstacle rather than having to go around them.”

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