Penny Coomes and Nicholas Buckland may have failed to deliver a British medal at the ISU European Figure Skating Championships but their sixth-place finish proved there is life after John and Sinead Kerr.

Ice dance duo Coomes and Buckland were sitting fourth after the short dance, offering hope of a medal in Sheffield, but eventually dropped two places overall following the free dance.

However not only was sixth their best-ever finish after three attempts together at the Europeans but also their best-ever performance in terms of personal bests with both recorded in the short and free dance.

They scored 59.78 in the short dance and 85.53 in the free for a personal best combined total of 145.31 to undoubtedly leave Sheffield’s Motorpoint Arena on a cloud of optimism.

That is also Britain’s best finish at these European Championships so far with Stacey Kemp and David King and Sally Hoolin and James Hunt ninth and 16th respectively in the pairs.

Siblings John and Sinead Kerr were the last British ice dance medallists at the Europeans having taken bronze last year before announcing their retirement from competitive skating months later.

But they appear to have left British ice dancing in rude health with the future bright for Coomes and Buckland, who finished 20th to the Kerrs’ eighth at their maiden Winter Olympics in Vancouver in 2010.

French duo Nathalie Pechalat and Fabian Bourzat retained their title ahead of Russians Ekaterina Bobrova and Dmitri Soloviev for the second year running and Elena Ilinykh and Nikita Katsalapov while Coomes and Buckland’s fellow Brits, Louise Walden and Owen Edwards, were 13th.

Sportsbeat / Eurosport