Great Britain opened their diving campaign at the 2022 European Aquatics Championships in Rome with a bronze medal in the mixed team event.
Off the back of winning a wealth of medals at the Commonwealth Games, the quartet of Noah Williams, Andrea Spendolini-Sirieix, Grace Reid and James Heatly joined forces to battle for glory at heights of 3m and 10m.
The English pair of Williams and Spendolini-Sirieix took to the 10m platform for their final dive, but both of them slightly over-rotated their inward 3.5 tucked forward somersault to leave the door open for Germany.
However, Germany failed to score any higher than 7.0s on their last routine, and GB celebrated clinching the final spot on the podium with a total score of 384.70.
The quartet hailed their achievement so soon after representing their various nations at the Commonwealth Games, with Heatly telling BBC Sport: "It's crazy to think that [the Commonwealth Games] was only a week ago!
"The fact we've had such a quick turnaround has been insane. It's nice not to be Scotland and England this time and be up there together as Britain."
Reid added: "Everyone's had such great success this whole summer and to get out there today and win a medal straight off the bat is great. I'm excited to see what everyone here can do."
Jumping off the diving boards and onto the podium! 🥉🙌@JamesHeatly, Grace Reid, Andrea Spendolini-Sirieix and Noah Williams take bronze in the Mixed Team Event #Roma2022 pic.twitter.com/WuJMxKjqTM
— British Swimming (@britishswimming) August 15, 2022
Seventeen-year-old Spendolini-Sirieix emerged as a breakthrough star of the Commonwealth Games, taking two golds and one silver in Birmingham before jetting off to the Europeans.
However, the English diver admitted that she did not set her expectations too high for her first senior international outdoor competition, saying: "For the first time competing outside I'm here to do my best, have a great experience and try something new.
"It's really hot. Sometimes there's a bit of a wind so that pushes you to go a bit faster. It's very different to diving indoors, but I'm really happy with how we did and it's a great start to the week."
Finally, Williams - who already experienced silver medal joy at the 2018 and 2020 Europeans on the 10m platform in the synchro competitions - added: "Everybody dived really well.
"It tough coming from the Commonwealth Games to competing outdoors straight away so I'm really proud of all of them. I'm knackered, I'm so ready to go on holiday but only one week left so we're going to give it our last push!"
Italy stormed to the crown with a total of 402.55, and a score of 399.05 was good enough for Ukraine to win the silver medal in Rome.
Ben Knapton
