SIR – The remarkable success of Team GB in the recent Olympic Games cannot fail to produce a huge upsurge in national pride.

Quite rightly – because, as in other times of adversity, (1914 to 1918 and 1939 to 1945, for example) the inhabitants of these islands have proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that we are at our very best when our backs are to the wall.

Before the dust settles, and before the inhabitants of Westminster begin to bask in whatever reflected glory they can from the individual successes, it is as well to remember that this Government’s contribution to their success is that they have continually cut school funding for sport in State schools and continue to sell-off school sports fields to developers.

So, quite rightly, the British athletes deserve the very highest praise, because not only did they overcome the great physical demands of their particular sport, but they also overcame a state infrastructure, which effectively writes off huge swathes of the population from an early age. Our athletes have succeeded ‘in spite’ of this.

My earlier reference to the spirit of the two World Wars is not accidental. Once again it is a case of ‘lions led by donkeys’.

Christopher Hindle, Osterley Grove, Bradford