England’s Joe Fraser flips his way to gold in team gymnastics final at the Commonwealth Games

Joe Fraser flew, flipped and spun over the most painful of barriers before landing as a Commonwealth Games gold medallist in extraordinary circumstances on Friday night.

While it was a title shared in England’s successful defence of the team crown, there was no doubting that the brightest star of the five was Fraser, who revealed a day earlier he would be competing on a broken right foot.

That fracture was diagnosed only a fortnight ago, which in turn followed three weeks after he was rushed to hospital with a ruptured appendix. 

Taking those ailments into account, what the 23-year-old achieved in dominating the pommel horse and horizontal bar disciplines was remarkable, and perhaps only eclipsed by him finishing second on the rings and parallel bars, given he nailed what appeared to be excruciating landings in each.

Fraser spearheaded England’s charge for gold as they finished ahead of Canada and Cyprus

His scores played a huge role in what collectively was a performance of domination by his colleagues James Hall, Jake Jarman, Giarni Regini-Moran and Courtney Tulloch, who added to Fraser accounted for the highest individual scores on each of the six apparatus. 

Combined their score of 254.550 was a street clear of Canada and Cyprus in silver and bronze respectively.

Heightened credit ought to go to Regini-Moran, who led the tables in both the parallel bars and floor, as well as second in the vault, which was won by Jarman, before the top rating for the rings was scored by Tulloch. 

Hall, a consistent scorer in each, will be favourite for the all-around gold on Sunday, and will face competition from Jarman.

Until Thursday, that marquee title seemed sure to go to Fraser, but he will remain in the hunt for multiple other individual medals in the coming week, assuming his body can withstand the torment.

The 23-year-old admitted building up to the event that he would compete with a broken foot

His fantastic performances combined to help Team England reach a score of 254.550

A big assumption, of course. Illustration of that came from his landing off the parallel bars, which he achieved with the tiniest of stutters but with a large grimace scratched into his face – plainly the 2019 world champion for the discipline was in agony. 

Ditto after the rings, but he was truly exceptional on the pommel and the horizontal bar.

The win secured a repeat of the 2018 team gold won by England, with Hall and Tulloch part of that ensemble. 

It also brought a little much-needed gloss to the sport in this country on the back of the appalling scandals that have been revealed in gymnastics across the past couple of years.