Jade Johnson is adamant she can do herself justice at the Commonwealth Games in Melbourne despite struggling against injury for most of 2005.

Johnson, the 2002 long jump silver-medallist, will travel Down Under having missed all last summer's season and with a restricted winter indoor programme thanks to a recurrence of her back injury.

If she can recapture the magical form that saw her finish runner-up in Manchester and then match that placing at the European Championships a fortnight later, it would be a tremendous achievement.

Those successes seemed the first positive stepping stones at senior level en route to a fourth place in the following year's World Championships which confirmed her global status.

But since then a disappointing seventh in the 2004 Olympic final fell below expectation and a wrecked season last year hampered her anticipated progress.

However, the 25-year-old Londoner remains convinced she will be ready to battle for top honours in her second Games appearance when she reaches Australia.

Yet the former European Under-23 champion will realise in the back of her mind that only competition makes perfect - and that is something she is badly lacking.

"It's been a year since my last competition," she said. "It would have been nice to have registered a jump but I'm just glad to be back."

Now the onus will be on her and coach John Herbert to fine tune the technical skills of the talented Herne Hill woman and get her back into the form which hopefully will see her jump to a second Games medal.