Bronze for Laugher and Goodfellow at FINA Diving World Series

Jack Laugher and Dan Goodfellow won a bronze medal as the first leg of the FINA Diving World Series got underway in Japan.

Nine of Great Britain’s top divers have begun their preparations for the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games after travelling to Sagamihara, a suburb of the Japenese capital where next year’s Olympic Games are being held, for the competition.

And Olympic and Commonwealth champion Laugher and his new partner Goodfellow were both delighted after picking up third place in their first international competition together.

The duo scored 420.51 to finish 7.35 points behind the second-placed Mexican pair of Jahir Ocampo Marroquin and Rommel Pacheco Marrufo (427.86).

China’s Yuan Can and Siyi Xie topped the podium with a total of 446.82.

Laugher said: “After nationals, I just wanted to come out here and put a good synchronised performance together and we’ve really shown that we have massive potential together.

“420 is a great score and I’m really happy – I thought we would be decent, but not amazing, but it was really good and we’re really happy with it.”

Goodfellow added: “I think it was a really good competition considering it was our first international, our first World Series and my first 3m springboard competition in the synchro!

“I think we just wanted to put a good synchro performance as we highlighted some things at nationals that we weren’t happy with and we just wanted to do some good, consistent hurdle steps, but the individual dives turned out to be really good as well.

“It’s great to go out to the World Series and in the first couple of rounds get a medal under your belt.

“It boosts your confidence, especially as a new pairing, and, hopefully, other countries have seen our performance and seen that we’re contenders for the medals.”

Great Britain came narrowly close to adding to their medal haul as both Tom Daley and Matty Lee and Grace Reid and Kat Torrance finished fourth in their respective competitions.

Daley and Lee finished on 387.93 in the men’s 10m Synchro in their first international competition together.

And Reid and Torrance ended on 281.67 in the women’s 3m Synchro behind China, Canada and Australia.

Eden Chang, who is making her first appearance in the FINA World Series, and Lois Toulson were sixth in the women’s 10m Synchro after scoring 282.78.

The competition runs until Sunday 3 March and Laugher will be in action in the Men’s 3m Springboard, while Matty Lee and Lois Toulson are competing in the Mixed 10m Synchro final.

London will host the final leg of the FINA World Series between 17-19 May.

Picture: Team GB Twitter