Kelly Holmes' performance in Athens has been hailed as "absolutely supreme" by fellow double Olympic champion Lord Sebastian Coe.

The 34-year-old former Army sergeant became Britain's greatest ever female Olympian when she added 1,500metres gold to her 800m title in Athens on Saturday night.

And Coe, who won 1,500m gold in Moscow and again four years later at Los Angeles in 1984, believes her achievement cannot be underestimated.

"She has gone through each race without putting a foot wrong," Lord Coe told BBC Radio Five Live's Sportsweek programme.

"Really it was text-book middle-distance running, it has just been perfect.

"Kelly is only the third woman to have achieved this (the others were Svetlana Masterkova in 1996 and Tatyana Kazankina in 1976) - it is not something which happens regularly or has been done by that many people.

"In historic terms, and athletics terms, what Kelly did last night was absolutely supreme."

Holmes has no intentions of quitting the sport, and plans to take some of Britain's top junior hopefuls to a training camp in South Africa to pass on her experience to potential medallists at the next Games in Beijing.

Sports Minster Richard Caborn reflected: "That is fantastic and what sport is all about."

Holmes has been given the honour of carrying the flag for the Great Britain team during Sunday's closing ceremony in Athens.

And Simon Clegg, chef de mission for Team GB at the Athens Games, declared: "It is unbelievable. I think she has run two perfect races and that is why I asked her to carry the flag at the closing ceremony."

While Clegg was delighted by the overall achievements of the British team, he admitted the haul from the track and field events had been disappointing.

Holmes' second victory of the Games was swiftly followed by a shock gold for the men's 4x100m relay squad of Jason Gardener, Darren Campbell, Marlon Devonish and Mark Lewis-Francis, which gave Team GB a huge boost on the final night of athletics at the Olympic Stadium.

Britain finished the track and field events with three golds and one bronze from Kelly Sotherton in the heptathlon, compared to their six-medal haul in Sydney four years ago.

Saturday night's heroics lifted Britain to ninth place in the overall medals table with a guaranteed medal to come from 17-year-old boxer Amir Khan still to come.

"The target set some three months ago for this team was to return with between six and nine gold medals, and in excess of 25 medals, and I am delighted that we have done that," reflected Clegg.

"We are judged by medals and we will take a full and thorough analysis of every performance, to determine if we have set the bar at the right level with a view to moving the sport forwards in the future."

Clegg added: "It has been a fairly mixed performance by the track and field team, and we will sit down with UK Athletics and do a thorough analysis of this.

"But, on the surface of it, there are far too many athletes who are not getting through the first rounds, and that is something we are going to have to address in the future."