With Zharnel Hughes and Jeremiah Azu, Jacobs faced an easier task than expected in the defence of his 100m title. The Olympic champion just failed to break 10 seconds, something he has not done since beating the British pair to take the European title in Munich in August 2022, but his time of 10.02 saw him take gold ahead of team-mate Ali who clocked a personal best of 10.05 after being shown a yellow card for a faulty start. Britain's Romell Glave was third in 10.06.

"I had three goals: health, defending the European title and then the Olympic one," said Jacobs afterwards, "I won again and I am very glad of it. It was the first time in this season that I ran two races closely. In the final I felt a cramp on the right calf but I went on, I gritted my teeth because I wanted to win, ahead of this amazing crowd."

That took Italy's gold tally to three for the day - all secured in the space of 20 minutes - and five overall to leave the hosts well clear in the medal table. Leonardo Fabbri started the gold rush in the shot put with a championship record 22.45m ahead of Croatia's Filip Mihaljevic and Michal Haratyk of Poland. Lorenzo Simonelli then ran 13.05 to claim the 110m hurdles title from Spaniard Enrique Llopis, in a personal best 13.16, and Swiss hurdler Jason Joseph.

Reigning 1500m Olympic champion Jakob Ingebrigtsen looked in trouble with a couple of laps to go in the 5000m, but soon extricated his way out of being boxed in before taking control 400 metres from the finish. The Norwegian completed a hat-trick of 5000m triumphs in 13:20.11 with George Mills of Britain taking silver ahead of Switzerland's former South Sudanese refugee Dominic Lobalu.

Sandra Elkasevic, better known under her maiden name Perkovic, became the first athlete to win seven European titles. Croatia's two-time Olympic discus champion threw a season's best 67.04m in round one and that was enough for a seventh consecutive victory. Dutchwoman Jorinde van Klinken was second with 65.99m, adding to her silver in the shot, with Portugal's Liliana Ca (64.53m) in third.

Greece's Miltiadis Tentoglou retained his long jump title with a championship record 8.65m in round five before matching that distance with his final effort. The world and Olympic champion was clear of Italy's Mattia Furlani, who jumped a world under-23 record of 8.38m in second, with Simon Ehammer of Switzerland in third with 8.31m.

There was another championship record in the 100m hurdles as Cyrena Samba-Mayela ran 12.31 to underline her medal credentials on home soil at the Paris Olympics. Ditaji Kambundji of Switzerland was second in 12.40 with Poland's Pia Skrzyszowska running a personal best 12.42 in third.

Sweden was on top in the men's 20km walk with Perseus Karlström winning in 1:19:13. He was 18 seconds clear of Spain's Paul McGrath with Italy's Francesco Fortunato taking bronze.

After world champion Katarina Johnson-Thompson's withdrawal from the heptathlon on day one, Nafi Thiam was largely untroubled as she completed a hat-trick of European titles. Belgium's double Olympic gold medallist totalled 6,848 points with France's Auriana Lazraq-Khlass (6,635) taking silver and Thiam's compatriot Noor Vidts (6,596) rounding out the podium.

After two days, Italy leads the medal table with five golds, four silvers and a bronze. No other nation has won more than one gold so far.