LAUGHER LEADS A GOLDEN ONE-TWO
IT WAS a tale of two divers, one familiar with success, the other tasting it for the first time. And it was a tale of two parents, one who lives in the limelight, the other who cried when first thrust into it. The end result was two gold medals for England. But it was the storylines that came with them which made this such a special night.
First, let’s deal with Jack Laugher, who won his sixth Commonwealth Games gold medal in the one-metre springboard, as his team-mate Jordan Houlden claimed bronze. The England flagbearer’s victory was a familiar result and there was also a familiar face smiling back at him across the pool. His mother Jackie is the head recorder, a job she also did at London 2012 and Glasgow 2014. ‘Hopefully I’ve done my mum on poolside proud,’ said Laugher, 27, who also dedicated his win to his late grandma Bernice, Jackie’s mum. ‘My mum is always the first person I see when I’ve finished competing. I love having her there and it’s really nice that she’s there to celebrate this performance with me. I said some nice words about her on the big screen and I made her cry.’ An hour later, Andrea Spendolini-Sirieix was the one in tears after her victory in the 10m platform. The 17-year-old’s father is Fred Sirieix, the maitre d’ on Channel 4’s First Dates, and he was sitting in the stands as his daughter stormed to her maiden senior international title. Spendolini-Sirieix, whose team-mate Lois Toulson — Laugher’s girlfriend — got silver, said: ‘He couldn’t come to Tokyo last year but he prioritised coming to Birmingham. When I saw him, he just gave me a thumbs up. I think he didn’t say much because he didn’t want to cry.’