IMAGE|| MICHAEL WILLSON
Compiled by David Tarbotton
On day eight of competition, Australia won the inaugural Commonwealth Games men’s beach volleyball competition. Athletics continued to contribute with five medals, while shooting added two gold.
There was a special moment when lawn bowler 68-year-old Ken Hanson won gold as a member of the B6/B7/B8 Triples. Hanson became the oldest gold medallist in Australian Commonwealth Games history.
GOLD MEDALS (6)
Athletics Men’s Pole Vault Kurtis MARSCHALL
Athletics Women’s Discus Throw Dani STEVENS
Beach Volleyball Damien SCHUMANN Christopher MCHUGH
Diving Women’s 10m Platform Melissa WU
Lawn Bowls Open B6/B7/B8 Triples Ken HANSON Josh THORNTON Tony BONNELL
Lawn Bowls Women’s Triples Carla KRIZANIC Natasha SCOTT Rebecca van ASCH
SILVER MEDALS (3)
Athletics Women’s Long Jump Brooke STRATTON
Athletics Women’s T38 100m Rhiannon CLARKE
Beach Volleyball Taliqua CLANCY Mariafe ARTACHO DEL SOLAR
BRONZE MEDALS (2)
Athletics Men’s 800m Luke MATHEWS
Diving Men’s 3m Springboard James CONNOR
ATHLETICS
Another tremendous night for Australia with five medals. Dani Stevens defended her discus crown in style with a Games record throw of 68.26m. 20-year-old Kurtis Marschall won a terrific battle with 2015 world champion Shawn Barber (CAN) to take the pole vault with a clutch third attempt clearance at 5.70m. Brooke Stratton made up for missing the Glasgow Games with injury to win silver with a leap of 6.77m. Clocking an impressive time of 13.17 seconds in the T38 100m event, Rhiannon Clarke, 15, won the silver medal. A surprise medal was won by half-miler Luke Mathews in the 800m, our first in the event for 16 years.
BADMINTON
There have been some good performances by Australia in the round of 16 matches in the individual events at the badminton.
The number one seeds in the women’s doubles Gronja Somerville and Setyana Mapasa, after having a bye in the opening round, cruised through their round of 16 clash against Danielle Whiteside and Alyssa Dean.
Anthony Joe was gallant in going down to the number three seed in the men’s singles to number 12 in the world, Prannoy Kumar of India 21-18, 21-11. Wendy Chen was also eliminated in the women’s singles by another of the world’s best also from India, Venkata Pursarla.
The news was better with mixed doubles combination Sawan Serasinghe and Setyana Mapasa progressing to the quarter finals with a comfortable straight games victory.
Australia’s last match of the night was epic and had the crowd at fever pitch as men’s doubles pair, Matthew Chau and Sawan Seransinghe, will probably rue the one that got away against the more favoured Singapore team of Terry Hee and Tan Wei Han.
Chau and Serasinghe had 2 game points the first game with the crowd on their side, but couldn’t it out with Singapore winning 23-21. The home team, though, made no mistake in the second, being by far the better combination and took the match to a decider winning that second set 21-16.
They started the third set well and led 10-8, but the turning point was a seven point run by Singapore and it was a bridge too far with Hee and Christanta eliminating the brave Australians 21-14.
BEACH VOLLEYBALL
It took every bit of three sets and every reserve of talent Australia could draw on, but Chris McHugh and Damien Schumann have become the first ever Commonwealth Games beach volleyball gold medallists.
With their backs against the wall and trailing 12-9 in a race to 15 in the third and final set, the Australians came back from the brink and secure the first ever beach volleyball gold medal.
Mariafe Artacho del Solar and Taliqua Clancy fell just short of securing the golden double for Australia, dropping the gold medal match to Canada in straight sets.
The Aussie pair were unlucky not to extend the match, falling just two points short of Canada in both sets as the big plays fell in favour of Humana-Paredes and Pavan.
CYCLING – MOUNTAIN BIKE
Daniel and Rebecca McConnell flew the flag for Australia in the brutal men’s and women’s mountain bike event at the Gold Coast 2018 Commonwealth Games.
The pair that married last year were both hoping to upgrade the bronze medals they won in Glasgow in 2014, but struggled on the technically challenging Nerang Mountain Bike course, with Bec finishing in sixth place in a time of 1:22:32, and Dan crossing the line in 1:19:59 to finish in seventh place.
The pair competed at the London and Rio Olympics together but GC2018 was their first Games as husband and wife.
GYMNASTICS – RHYTHMIC
Australia came agonisingly close to another medal in the Rhythmic Gymnastics competition at the Gold Coast 2018 Commonwealth Games today, with Enid Sung finishing fourth in today’s Individual All-Around final.
After qualifying for the All-Around final in sixth position after yesterday’s first day of competition, Sung was happy to just be competing on day two, something that came unexpectedly. Sung came out onto the comp floor and absolutely captivated the audience – and the judges – with her first routine of the day; scoring 13.100 in Hoop.
After the first rotation Sung sat in sixth position in the All-Around calculations, however as the competition continued she began to climb, sitting fifth position after Ball and fourth after Clubs.
Sung’s younger teammate, 16-year-old Alexandra Kiroi-Bogatyreva, also returned to the Commonwealth stage today, competing alongside her in the All-Around final. She started strongly with her Hoop routine, looking like she had got rid of the nerves that hovered over this routine on day one of competition, registering a score of 11.950. However despite the remainder of her routines being free of major errors, small mistakes around the execution of her masteries were penalised on the scoreboard.
Kiroi-Bogatyreva came away from the final with an All-Around score of 46.100 and a 10th place ranking – a huge achievement for the teenager, especially seeing as she is competing at her first major competition at the Senior International level.
HOCKEY – WOMEN
The Hockeyroos have advanced to the GC2018 gold medal match, following a narrow 1-0 victory over India under the bright lights of the Gold Coast Hockey Centre this evening.
In the first half, Captain Emily Smith and Games’ debutants Savannah Fitzpatrick and Grace Stewart showed skill and flare in attack, but were unable to break through the resolute Indian defence.
The breakthrough, however, came in the eight minute of the third quarter, when Stewart found the back of the net with an exceptional deflection, to score her second goal of the tournament.
India opted to play with a kicking back for the final four minutes of the match, in a desperate attempt to score – and the strategy nearly paid off in the dying minutes when veteran goalkeeper Rachael Lynch was called into action to make a remarkable save from a loose ball in the circle.
The Roos held on to their narrow lead in a nail-biting finish and will play Trans-Tasman rivals New Zealand in the gold medal match on Saturday, after the Kiwis defeated England in a thrilling penalty shoot-out in the other semi-final.
LAWN BOWLS
Australia’s Carla Krizanic, Natasha Scott and Rebecca Van Asch have tonight become the first dual gold medallists of the GC2018 bowls competition.
The trio secured their second gold medal after toppling Scotland in the women’s triples’ ultimate decider, 21-12, to add to the women’s fours medallion won on Monday.
Australia’s bowls team also created history, with the bowlers with a disability triples defeating New Zealand 14-13, with 68-year-old Games debutant Ken Hanson (skip) becoming the oldest Australian Commonwealth Games gold medalist in the process.
SHOOTING
Seasoned shooters Robyn Ridley and Suzy Smith contested the women’s 50m rifle prone on day five of GC2018 competition at the Belmont Shooting Centre, finishing ninth and 12th respectively. 18-year-old Martina Lindsay Veloso from Singapore claimed her second gold medal of the Games, winning today’s 50m rifle prone after clinching the 10m air rifle earlier in the week.
Defending champion in the men’s 25m rapid fire pistol, David Chapman, has qualified for the second stage of the competition tomorrow, alongside Games debutant recently crowned world university champion Sergei Evgelevski. The Aussies Evgelevski and Chapman qualified in fifth and eighth, respectively.
SQUASH
Australia has won every doubles match in squash today, cementing themselves spots in tomorrow’s quarterfinal. Starting off the day right was dream team pairing Donna Urquhart and Cameron Pilley in the mixed doubles defeating the Cayman Island’s Marlene West and Cameron Stafford 2-0. In the same fashion, Rachael Grinham and doubles partner Ryan Cuskelly defeated Pakistani heavyweights Madina Zafar and Tayyab Aslam.
While it was a win and a loss in one match, the two mixed doubles partners found themselves up against each other with Urquhart and Pilley as the successful pairing in the quarterfinal.
In the men’s doubles rounds, Ryan Cuskelly and Cameron Pilley defeated Jason-Ray Khalil and Sunil Seth of Guyana, while Zac Alexander and David Palmer defeated Peter Creed and Joel Makin of Wales in two sets.
TABLE TENNIS
It was a day of mixed results for Australia’s table tennis athletes. The individual pool matches continued, with Melissa Tapper losing her match against Singapore, however Jian Fang Lay defeated Malaysia in a 4-1 showdown.
In the men’s division, Heming Hu lost to India’s Sarath Achanta 4-1.
The men’s doubles rounds are still underway, with the Australian pairing of Heming Hu and Xin Yan proving strong, winning against Trinidad and Tobago.
The final pool rounds of the women’s doubles tournaments finished today, with both pairings of Miao Miao and Jian Fang Lay, as well as Melissa Tapper and Michelle Bromley winning their matches. Unfortunately, neither pairing were able to hold their streak, losing the quarterfinals and knocking them out of medal contention.
The mixed doubles had similar results, with all four matches being awarded to the otherside. Trent Carter and Tracey Feng lost to England 3-1, Heming Hu and Melissa Tapper were defeated 3-2 by Singapore, Xin Yan and Jian Fang Lay lost 2-3, and Trent Carter and Tracy Feng also lost their match.
In the Para-table tennis events, Melissa Tapper and Andrea McDonnell both won their matches against Papua New Guinea and India 3-0, respectively, however Barak Mizrachi lost his to Theo Cogill of Trinidad and Tobago 3-1. Tapper and McDonnell will now progress to the semifinals, and will compete against each other for a spot in the gold medal match.
WRESTLING
Australia has just missed out on bronze on the first day of competition of the wrestling at the
Commonwealth Games. Connor Evans, who had given up full time work to devote more time to his wrestling in the lead up to the Games, was defeated by his Canadian opponent 14 points to 4 in the bronze medal fight.
Gold Coaster, Tom Cicchini won his first match and lost the next two and Naomi de Bruine in the 76 Kilo class was well beaten in her only encounter.
Clarissa Holland went down in all of her matches in a round robin tournament competition, for the 53 kilo women’s class. The competition was structure that way for the division due to a small field size.
