Andrea Spendolini-Sirieixflops – but only after winning gold
Andrea Spendolini-Sirieix clinched her second gold of the Commonwealth Games in the mixed synchronised 10m platform.
The 17-year-old had already won gold in the 10m platform and silver in the synchronised event.
On Monday she partnered Noah Williams to victory in Sandwell with a score of 333.06 as England team-mates Kyle Kothari and Lois Toulson claimed silver.
That helped push Team England to their biggest Commonwealth Games medal haul ever, beating Glasgow’s tally of 174.
Spendolini-Sirieix, who celebrated her success with a belly flop into the pool, said: “I’m very honoured to have been a part of this team, it was extremely strong and we showed everyone how powerful we are.
“I came here with no expectations, I just wanted to have fun and improve all of my dives. I made a decision to train even harder than I was over the last couple of months and it definitely worked.
“I’m not going to put pressure on myself. Whether there is external pressure or not the internal pressure is the one which makes you crumble.”
Regarding the belly flop, the teenager added: “I told Noah, if we do well we can all belly flop (to celebrate). So I got Kyle, Lois, me and Noah and said ‘come and guys let’s go and belly flop’. They didn’t really know what was happening but we had fun and it was the perfect way to end the competition.
“Now we have got Europeans so I will focus on that, after that I will take a break, have my summer holiday and come back even stronger.”
Spendolini-Sirieix has been one of the stories of the Games, with father Fred, the maitre d’ on Channel 4’s First Dates, promising to take his daughter to New York after her first gold.
She and Williams were second after the opening dives but moved into top spot the following round.
They remained there in a battle with Kothari and Toulson and an inward 31/2 somersaults tuck left them in pole position ahead of the final round and they took gold by 14.52 points ahead of their team-mates.
Earlier, Scotland’s James Heatly and Grace Reid took the gold in the mixed synchronised 3m springboard.
England’s Ben Cutmore and Desharne Bent-Ashmeil were fourth with Jordan Houlden and Yasmin Harper eighth.
An inward 21/2 somersaults pike from Cutmore and Bent-Ashmeil kept them in medal contention after three rounds.
They improved and were in second heading into the final round but a last dive of 63.00 saw them miss out on the medals.
