Ageing Big Ben hopes to tick again as panel meets at Seville on Aug 17

The three-man group, led by IAAF general-secretary Istvan Gyulai, will recommend to the body’s council whether or not to allow the runner back into competition.

If the council, which meets in Seville on Aug 17, decides against Johnson it will be the end of the road: there is no possibility of an appeal.

But Johnson is confident of a comeback and even at 37 is dreaming of a return to the very top.

“My day will come. I have to clear my name and I hope to be in the Olympics next year,” he told the Associated Press after the meeting. “Things will be ok in a few weeks.”

His hopes rest on the high-level sub committee’s assessment of his advisers’ case.

Yesterday, it met for one-hour with John Thresher, president of Athletics Canada, which supports the runner’s reinstatement, before a two-hour dialogue with Johnson and his team.

“We had a very frank discussion and got a good impression from IAAF,” Gary Boyd, Johnson’s lawyer, told AP. “Even with a tough anti-doping policy there must be a route for due process athletes must be able to make their case.”

IAAF officials declined to comment.

“I can’t speculate on what happened,” said IAAF spokesman Georgio Reineri. “But the heart of the case is to know whether Athletics Canada made a mistake in its procedure.”

That’s not exactly how Johnson’s entourage sees it.

Boyd said it isn’t just a question of procedure — Johnson wasn’t given the right to a full appeal after a 1993 positive drugs test — but also of how his urine sample was tested.