Mahama Cho will take his inspiration from diving legend Tom Daley after his early exit from the men’s heavyweight tournament at Tokyo 2020.

The 2017 World Championship silver medallist suffered golden point agony in his +80kg, last 16 bout against Chinese rival, Sun Hongyi.

And while Hongyi won his quarter-final bout against Croatia’s Ivan Sapina, defeat to Vladislav Larin of Russia in the semis denied Cho a shot at bronze through a lifeline repechage bout.

While disappointed Cho, who will celebrate his 32^nd birthday next month, was quick to look ahead.

“If you are not mentally strong enough you won’t be able to accept these kinds of circumstances,” he said.

“I am prepared for whatever comes. When your plan doesn’t work, you don’t give up, you keep working.

“I am going to keep on pushing through and see what Paris looks like,” added the positive fifth seed.

Cho narrowly missed a medal at Rio 2016 and believes he can still make it third time lucky at the 2024 Olympics in the French capital.

“Tom Daley is a perfect example,” said Cho of his Team GB teammate who, with Matty Lee captured gold in Monday’s synchronised 10 metre platform competition.

“This was his fourth Olympics and he finally got that gold medal. It goes to show, if you keep pushing it can happen.

“It does hurt, but it is all about progress and what can you do better. It is all about progress.”

On his narrow defeat to 27-year-old Hongyi, Cho said: “Sun did very well, he had a good strategy and it worked.

“Unfortunately, it had to go to that extra round. Someone had to lose and unfortunately it was me.”