Tom Daley finished his first Olympic experience with a highly commendable seventh place in the men’s individual 10m platform event in the Water Cube. Daley, at 14, the second youngest British Olympian and easily the youngest of the 12 finalists, saved his best form for the final, but could not match the form of Matthew Mitcham of Australia, who lept past long-time leader, Luxin Zhou, to deprive China of a clean sweep of diving gold medals with his very last dive.

Luxin Zhou was second, ahead of world champion, Gleb Galperin of Russia, who also left his challenge to the very last. Daley now knows precisely what level he needs to reach to fulfil his ambition of winning gold in London four years from now.

Daley, who recovered from a difficult debut in the synchronised diving event with Blake Aldridge, has always viewed Beijing as a stepping stone to his challenge for gold in London. But, as the European champion, he came to Beijing with a desire to compete hard against the formidable host team. He has not let himself down. He has become a celebrity in China where they specialise in child prodigies and laid down a marker for four years time at his home games when he will be all of 18.

After four dives, Daley was ranked eighth of the 12 finalists, but still in touch with the bronze medal position and with his favourite dive to come. The Plymouth schoolboy needed to hold his nerve in his first Olympic final and he did, but, surprisingly, the judges did not mark him as high as perhaps the dive, with a 3.3 tariff of difficulty, demanded. The Chinese certainly seemed as puzzled by the mark as the vociferous British contingent. Daley rose from eighth to sixth in the rankings.

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Shortly after Daley’s dive, competition leader Luxin Zhou scored three tens from the jugges and a score of 92.80 to all but secure a clean sweep of the gold medals for the home nation. Daley’s last dive was not good enough to lift him into contention for a medal, but the drama was to come with Mitcham executing a near faultless final dive of 3.8 difficulty to stun the home crowd. .