One of Cragg's chief rivals for gold, home town favourite Mo Farah fell and started to run the wrong way before battling back to qualify as a fastest loser out of the first heat, with a time of 7:55.36.

Having fallen over a trail leg, Farah regained his feet and briefly ran in the wrong direction before realising his error.

Buoyed by his run, Cragg said afterwards: "I'm ready - I felt very good today. I feel sorry for Mo, you don't want that to happen to anyone. I could have injected some pace at that point but didn't want to do that.

"Then one of the Spanish guys injected the pace anyway. The final will be a level playing field, we will all be fresh and it's anyone's game."

Moldova's Iaroslav Musinchi took the field through the first lap and led up to the 1600m mark before Espana, Weidlinger and Cragg took turns at the head of proceedings.

Cragg was overtaken in the final 200 metres but looked comfortable as one of the first four automatic qualifiers for tomorrow afternoon's final, which gets underway at 3.40pm. The South African-born runner is the third fastest qualifier for the final.

Ireland's two other competitors in the 3000m, Mark Carroll and Mark Christie were well off their best in the second heat.

Carroll, the European Indoor champion at this distance in 2000, clocked 8:12.60 - over ten seconds slower than his season's best - for tenth place.

Mullingar man Christie, 22, came home last of the field in twelfth in a disappointing time of 8:33.61.