Hard day for Scots athletes
Gymnast Frank Baines finished just out of the medals in fourth in the men’s individual all-around event.
Englishman Nile Wilson pipped countryman James Hall to gold.
Scots star Baines just missed out on bronze to Marios Georgiou of Cyprus but said: “I was happy to go out there, put on a good show and go clean on all six pieces.
“The bits that went wrong in podium training and qualification I wanted to get right. I am happy to come out in fourth place.”
Scotland’s triathlon team were left for dead by the sport’s big guns.
Bronze winner Marc Austin, Beth Potter and Grant Sheldon were joined by teenager Erin Wallace but they were off the pace from the start and finished seventh of eight with the Aussies taking gold.
Austin said: “Everyone got everything out of themselves so you can’t ask for much more.”
Para triathlete Karen Darke finished fourth in her event.
The nation’s hoops heroes – who beat England on day one – kept up their bid for basketball glory with a 63-52 win over Cameroon.
Gareth Murray, who top-scored with 25 points, said: “No one can catch us. That was the goal, to be first or second. It was a gritty game and we struggled with turnovers.”
Coach Rob Beveridge confessed: “That was one of the ugliest games I’ve ever been involved in.
“Defensively we were very good, offensively we stank.
“But we found a way of winning. That’s to do with the character and the togetherness of this group.”
The beach volleyball teams had mixed fortunes. Scotland’s women’s pair of Lynn Beattie and Mel Coutts were brought down to earth with a defeat to Cyprus.
But men’s d u o R o b i n Miedzybrodzki and Sean Cook pulled off a second straight 2-1 win, beating Sierra Leone.
Scotland pulled off a stunning 51- 47 win over rivals Wales in netball’s Pool B.
After a bruising defeat to England in their opener, the Thistles upset the higher seeds to keep their push for a top- eight place on track.
Skipper Clair Brownlie said: “Wales have improved, we knew they were going to come out fighting but we were happy with that game.”
Scotland’s men’s hockey team lost 1- 0 to Canada. They play the host nation this afternoon.
When the giant is your own mother? A World and Commonwealth champion, an Olympic silver medalist?
But Eilish McColgan insists she has never spent a day in the shadow of legend Liz – in either her own mind or her mum’s – because neither of them live in the past.
The 27-year-old hasn’t seen her medals, hasn’t sat through the clips on YouTube or had to listen to the ‘ in my day…’ memory lane lectures.
All she wants is for her mum to be by her side as coach and mentor.
And this week that has meant the world to her Down Under as she chases what she considers to be her first serious chance at a major 10,000m medal.
McColgan said: “Mum just wanted to make sure that I came into the sport because of me. She never wanted to force it on me or be a pushy mother.
“So it almost went the other way. From time to time she’ll mention things but she has never been one to force it on me.
“I’ve never actually watched her race. I don’t know why that is, it’s just the way my mum is.
“She doesn’t even have her medals out. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her Commonwealth Games medals. I don’t know where they are, don’t even know where she keeps them.
“She has always been low key about her achievements.”
There was nothing low key about what she did though.
Liz’s stellar show from her first Games gold in Edinburgh in 1986 through to glory on the world stage in Tokyo made her Scotland’s darling of the track.
Now based in Doha where she runs her own athletics club, she coaches Eilish from long distance, using video links.
But with the two of them together Down Under, her daughter admits they had a breakthrough moment last week – when she left mum speechless!
She grinned and said: “She’s definitely not one to sugarcoat anything.
“From time to time she’ll give advice, especially in training, because she still has training diaries from years ago.
“We’re completely different athletes in that she was very high mileage and I haven’t