BBC Online :
England won women’s team gymnastics gold at the Commonwealth Games by edging out Australia in a tense final.
Ondine Achampong, Georgia-Mae Fenton, Claudia Fragapane, Alice Kinsella and Kelly Simm held their nerve to top the scoreboard by just three points.
Victory meant the squad emulated their male counterparts, who won team gold on Friday – their third successive Commonwealth Games victory.
Wales and Scotland finished fifth and sixth respectively.
The hosts finished with 161.100, while Australia took silver and bronze went to Canada, who had claimed gold on the Gold Coast four years ago.
England led Australia by just 0.050 points going into the final rotation but had the advantage of taking on vault – a slightly easier apparatus to score points on than the floor faced by Australia.
After Olympic bronze medallist Kinsella had top-scored on the floor, 18-year-old Achampong posted a huge score of 14.150 on vault – the best score of the day. Fenton took top spot on the uneven bars while Australia’s Georgia Godwin scored highest on beam, closely followed by the English trio of Kinsella, Fenton and Achampong.
With the team’s top three scores counting, Simm – competing at her third Commonwealth Games – had her vault and uneven bars scores chalked off along with Fragapane, whose beam and floor scores were not high enough to be included.
Fragapane was returning to the team for the first time since sustaining an Achilles injury which kept her out of he 2018 Gold Coast Games, and her experience proved invaluable.
“It feels amazing,” she said. “I was probably emotional the whole time. I’ve had so many injuries but these girls helped me and got me to my feet today so I’m really really happy.”
Achampong, competing in her first senior major tournament, said: “It was so cool. It’s so different to junior and so much better. I’ve never had a crowd this big, so it was just so different.”
Fenton and Kinsella, who is from Birmingham, were part of the team that won silver in the event in 2018 – four years after England’s last gold.
“It felt amazing to be back out there with this amazing team. We all went clean, we came out here and enjoyed the whole experience and I’m super proud of everyone,” Kinsella said. Kinsella’s fellow Olympic bronze medallists Jessica and Jennifer Gadirova were missing from the team after choosing to focus on the European Championships in August.
The team event also acts as qualification for the individual apparatus finals and the all-around event and Kinsella, who won individual Commonwealth gold on the beam in 2018 as a 17-year-old, finished top of the standings for the all-around finals, just ahead of compatriot Achampong.
