Italy at last won its first European men's jumps title here tonight, as Andrew Howe dominated the long jump final from the start, his best effort of 8.20 metres, 7cm better than his closest rival.

The competition began in a tempest of thunder and lightning around the Ullevi Stadium, and it ended with Europe's new generation of long jumpers storming into control of the event.

Snatching the silver medal behind 21-year-old Howe - the 2002 World Junior champion - was teenager Greg Rutherford, the reigning European Junior champion. Rutherford went into the final round with a best of 8.03m from round two, but pushed the old guard, in the shape of the defending champion, Oleksiy Lukashevych, back into third, as he exceeded the Ukrainian's best effort by a single centimetre, measuring 8.13m.

Lukashevych, suffering from cramps in his legs, was unable to attack his final jump as he would have liked, and ran through the pit. "I've had many ups and downs since my win in Munich," he said. "I should be satisfied with the podium."

Fourth tonight, and the third member of the new generation, was another Ukrainian, Viktor Kuznetsov, who was 20 only last month, and who was briefly in a medal position after setting a personal best 7.96m in the first round.

While Italy celebrated a jumping breakthrough, the British team was entitled to its own little leap for joy: as well as having three men in the final, 19-year-old Rutherford's silver is the first by a Briton in this event since Lynn Davies placed second at the 1969 European Athletics Championships in Athens.

But this competition was all about Howe, and his family: his mother, Rene Felton, was the first to congratulate him. Since she is also his coach, she was entitled to be very proud.

With all the speed on the runway that you might expect of a former world junior 200m champion, added to tremendous height off the take-off board and a dynamic hitch-kick technique, he resembles a lighter-framed Mike Powell. The coaching sessions with Carl Lewis are obviously paying off.

And while the thunderstorm may have troubled his competitors, American-born Howe's series of jumps blew them away: 8.12m was followed by his winning 8.20m, then 8.04m, an 8.19m, one foul and then 8.13m to finish. Here was a class act.

"It's great that I won the gold medal," Howe said, "but I have to admit I wanted to jump further today and break my PB." That mark stands at 8.41m - exactly the same as the championship record that has stood for 24 years.

"I guess I tried a little bit too hard and put too much pressure on myself." Howe said that he would try to jump even further after the championships, when he next competes, at the Weltklasse meeting in Zurich.

"Never before have I jumped in front of so many people cheering for me," Howe said, as he thanked the Swedish crowd. "It was a pleasure for me.

"This is a fantastic feeling."

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