Tom Daley

Tom Daley failed to defend his Commonwealth men's 10m synchronised platform title alongside James Denny after missing out by 0.18 points in Glasgow.

Australia pair Matthew Mitcham and Domonic Bedggood claimed gold with a final score of 399.54, while Malaysia duo Malaysia's Ooi Tze Liang and Chew Yiwei finished third but were denied a medal to the number of competitors. Fourth place went to Canada.

While Daley was unable to hold onto his Commonwealth title, the competition will act as good preparation for the defence of his individual 10m platform title on Saturday, when he again goes up against Mitcham.

"We're a new pair and we've only done three training sessions together before the competition," Daley said. "We're pretty happy with the way we dived. If we had been told we would get a silver medal and do the final dive that we did, we would have been like yeah whatever.

"I wouldn't say I was surprised, although last time I was surprised because you never know what is going to happen under pressure when it counted. There are a lot of things to improve on and a lot of potential.

"It's agonisingly close and we know that, but we're really happy."

Despite being the double defending Commonwealth champion, Daley entered the competition in trepidation as he sought back-to-back titles, having endured an uncertain time since winning bronze at London 2012.

A tricep injury had derailed his World Championship campaign in 2013, while the new year had been dominated by media commitments and reports surrounding him coming out as gay.

Without a regular partner in the synchronised events, the 20 year old teamed up with Leeds-born Denny in a competitive outing for the first time, after just seven days training together ahead of the Games.

Though the newly crowned 3m British individual springboard champion, the Games represented Denny's first major competition appearance and as a result and England pair were unfancied to successfully defend the title.

Australia pair Mitcham and Bedggood, themselves relatively inexperienced as a pair, represented the sternest opposition in the four-team final and they took an early lead at the half-way point, while Canada, England and Malaysia were separated by four points in the fight for the remaining medals.

Excessive splash from Denny on the fourth dive, the back 3-½ somersault, damaged England's medal chances, while Malaysia put themselves into gold medal contention as Australia and Canada slipped back.

But Daley and Denny thrust themselves onto the podium with an inspired final dive scored at 95.46 and looked destined for gold until Australia's Mitcham and Bedggood did the business with their last dive to snatch gold away.

Denny added: "To finish on a dive like that you couldn't ask for much more. Tom just told me to give it my all and I did that and came out with the highest score."

Australia Gold