Tom Daley won his fifth Olympic medal with a superb silver alongside Noah Williams in the men’s synchronised 10m platform in Paris.
Daley, 30, effectively retired from the sport after winning gold in the event in Tokyo, but he and Williams, 24, looked calm as he returned to the biggest stage.
The pair applied pressure to China’s Lian Junjie and Yang Hao – who were ultimately in a class of their own for gold after three world titles in a row – and were comfortable silver medallists after six fine dives.
Daley did not compete for two years but was persuaded to come out of retirement when his son Robbie, now aged six, said he wanted to see his ‘Papa’ dive at an Olympics.
Daley’s husband Dustin Lance Black, Robbie, their youngest son Phoenix and countless more friends and family were in the Paris Aquatics Centre to give the British pair loud support.
“It’s just so special,” Daley said.
“Doing it in front of my son who asked me to come back is so special. I now have one of every colour, I’ve completed the set.”
His two sons were wearing t-shirts that read ‘That’s my Papa’ and the first flicker of emotion from Daley came as he blew a kiss to his family from the medal podium.
For Williams, whose first experience of diving was watching on TV as a 14-year-old Daley competed at his first Olympics in 2008, this was a first Olympic medal.
“Tom dove amazingly,” said Williams, who will also compete in the individual competition in the second week of the Games.
“The fact he dove like that, and China were really good as well, helped me to elevate how I normally dive to what I did today.”
Team GB now have five medals in Paris – three silvers and two bronzes.
In the build-up Daley said he had already achieved his gold medal.
Competing again at an Olympics, with his young family able to attend in support – unlike at the coronavirus-impacted Games of 2021 – was enough for him.
But still Daley departs, possibly for good this time, with an Olympic silver medal to add to his gold and three bronze medals.
That medal, as with all of the silverware at these Games, includes a piece of the Eiffel Tower in its centre, something Robbie wrote about recently at school.
“He’s six years old and I hope he’ll remember some of it,” Daley said. “He’ll be able to touch some of the Eiffel Tower.”
Daley and Williams were almost faultless, only beaten by a pair who produced one of best Olympic performances of this Games.
After being tied with Canadian pair Rylan Wiens and Nathan Zsombor-Murray after the first two dives, the British duo edged ahead with their third.
There were huge roars in the arena after they scored 93.96 with their fourth. Any realistic hopes of gold faded when China responded with 95.88 from their next effort.
But that cannot take away the achievement of Daley and Williams, who ended with a huge score of 93.24 to raise the roof when 40 points fewer would have been enough for silver.
Daley made his comeback in December last year.
He and Williams have trained together for a total of two months because Daley lives in Los Angeles, with their only practice coming at competitions.
Despite the hurdles, they finished the Olympic final with a score of 463.44, with China taking gold with a massive 490.35 and Canada bronze on 422.13.
Williams was in tears afterwards as he paid tribute to his former coach, who died after Tokyo.
Source: BBC SPORT
