ROSS Murdoch may be the first man in history who spends more time watching daytime home improvement programmes now than he did as a student. Now 23, the surprise poster boy of the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games was back in the city yesterday, to be unveiled as an ambassador for the 2018 European Championships, the new multi sport competition to be jointly hosted in Berlin and Glasgow next August.

First, though, he faced being quizzed about the difficulties he hit in the immediate aftermath of the Rio Olympics, when he saw his UK sport funding trimmed from around £28,000 to £15,000 and decided that his university course was an unnecessary drain on the limited time and resource he has to make the best of himself in the pool. Perhaps, though, the most surprising revelation of all was how the slack in his life had been taken up by a previously dormant interest in DIY. But then doing it yourself is an appropriate motif considering how Murdoch has resolved to go about things in his own way as he targets a return to the medal rostrum in next month’s World Championships in Budapest, ahead of further challenges in Glasgow, Gold Coast and the Tokyo Olympics in 2020.

“It’s obviously never great, losing funding,” said Murdoch, who is glad his pool costs and outlay upon medicine and sports scienceare all covered by the Scottish Institute of Sport. “It has definitely made things harder for me but you have to just budget a bit better and live within your means. For me, it’s a little bit of motivation when I turn up at the pool – to make sure next time round that the decision goes my way.

“Anyway, I was one of the lucky ones because I managed to keep most of my funding,” he added. “There are people who lost everything and that was a terrible thing for them. I can still afford to pay my mortgage, I can still afford to put petrol in my car and put food on the table. It just doesn’t allow me to do my job as easily because I can’t have everything I need. But I’ve got the essentials.”

Murdoch reckons that deferring the completion of his studies in sports and exercise science at the University of Stirling was a no brainer, ridding him of unnecessary additional stress. “For me, two things putting stress on my life wasn’t working for me,” he added. “I needed extra time in the pool – and to give my head a bit of a rest in the evening. I find it makes my life a lot easier to live without it and have my down time. It makes my road a little bit easier.

“What have I taken up instead? A bit of DIY. That is what my life has come to now - at least out of the pool. Perhaps I should go back to the studying! No, I have got my own place now and I have been scraping wallpaper off and I will soon be learning how to plaster and paint and everything else that goes with it. That is what I will focus my time into, trying to help improve my lifestyle, make things a little bit more comfortable for me. Homes Under the Hammer is pretty good for the tips, and seeing what people can do under their budget. Now that I’ve lost my funding I can perhaps take a few tips from them with their budgets!”

However tight the belt is, there was still enough slack for him to travel to a recent training camp in Thailand. The Olympics in Tokyo are still three years off, but this is all about training the body and mind about the difficulties of travelling east rather than west. “We were there to work, not play games or sightsee,” he said. “But I got myself from training in Thailand to Japan, jet-lagged, and had to race hard. I see myself working towards the Olympics, setting myself small performance goals along the way.”

One of those small performance goals is the small matter of next month’s World Championships in Budapest, where Murdoch will attempt to reach the final and more in both the 100m and 200m breaststroke, achievements which could see his funding situation improve again. And at least he doesn’t have to contend with English world record holder Adam Peaty over the longer range.

“This will be my third World Championships overall – but my first getting to swim the 200,” Murdoch said. “That’’s definitely where I see my expertise lying, my first opportunity to swim the 200m at a summer meet since the European Championships in 2014. But that’s on day five of the schedule. Day one is the 100, so I will be looking at both, trying to reach the finals in both.”

However that goes, Murdoch will be back in the limelight soon enough, with the Commonwealth Games in the Gold Coast serving as a nice little warm up for Glasgow 2018. “It just works out like a normal season for me, not like I need to prioritise anything over anything,” he said. “I think the public will fall in love with it [the European Championships]. After seeing 2014 and how big a success that was, maybe people underestimated how much they were actually going to love it. This time I hope people get behind it a little bit earlier.”