James Goddard was told he had claimed Britain's second swimming medal of the Olympic Games in the 200metres backstroke - before a decision to disqualify gold medal winner Aaron Peirsol was overturned and the Team GB man was pushed out of the top three again.

The 21-year-old from Manchester appeared to have suffered the agony of finishing fourth and missing out on a medal, but when Peirsol was disqualified he moved into the bronze position.

The British team in the stand at the Athens Aquatic Centre let out a huge cheer as the scoreboard flashed the fact that Peirsol had been disqualified for making an illegal turn at the 150m mark.

But the Americans launched an immediate appeal and they were successful, with a statement saying "the DSQ ... was not accepted due to the detail of the reason being inadequate".

Britain launched a counter appeal.

Had Goddard taken bronze, it would have meant national performance director Bill Sweetenham and the rest of the team would have captured another pool medal - their second of the Games following Stephen Parry's bronze in the 200m butterfly on Tuesday night.

But then came the dramatic re-instatement.

Gregor Tait, Goddard's British team-mate, was returned to seventh place after briefly being told he had been upgraded to sixth.

Swimming just outside of Peirsol in lane five, Goddard was in silver medal position for much of the race, but then in the final metres he dropped back into third and eventally was pipped for the bronze.

The scoreboard at first showed Peirsol winning, with Austrian Markus Rogan second and Razvan Florea of Romania third, until the controversial disqualification was announced, to be greeted by jeers from the Americans in the crowd.

They were soon cheering again, but the situation was rather farcical and unnecessarily dramatic.

The reason given for Peirsol's re-instatement as the gold medal winner read: "The disqualification of Aaron Peirsol was not accepted due to the detail of the reason supplied by the official being inadequate and not in the working language of FINA."

Goddard's time of one minute and 57.76 seconds was slower then his British and Commonwealth record which was set as he qualified for the final.

Tait's time in lane two was 1:59.28.