BIRMINGHAM: Australia dem­o­li­shed India 7-0 in the men’s hockey final on Monday to maintain their perfect record at the Commonwealth Games and end their gold medal hunt in style.

The six-time defending champions showed their opponents no mercy in sweltering conditions on the final day of sporting action in Birmingham.

Australia have won every gold medal in men’s hockey since the sport joined the Commonwealth Games programme in 1998.

The dominant Australians were 2-0 up after the first quarter and two goals from Jacob Anderson helped put them 5-0 up after 30 minutes.

Nathan Ephraums scored his second to make it 6-0 and Flynn Ogilvie completed the rout early in the final quarter.

Australia’s Blake Govers said the team had saved their best performance until last.

That’s what we pride ourselves on,” he said.“It’s awesome to do it without too much of a heart problem. We had to play with confidence and play forward and take the game on from the start, and that’s what we did. That’s the difference between the two games [final and semi-final against England].” Host nation England beat South Africa 6-3 to take bronze.

Australia have topped the medals table with 67 golds — 10 ahead of England. Canada are third with 26 golds and India have 22.

The closing ceremony takes place at Alexander Stadium later on Monday, bringing to an end 11 days of sporting action at the 22nd Commonwealth Games.

Elsewhere on Monday, Scot­land’s James Heatly and Grace Reid won the mixed synchronised 3m springboard final, with England pair Noah Williams and Andrea Spendolini-Sirieix taking gold in the 10m event.

India celebrated a golden double in badminton.

World number seven PV Sin­d­hu won the women’s singles, overcoming Canada’s Michelle Li while Lakshya Sen beat Malaysia’s Ng Tze Yong to win the men’s gold.

India’s Sharath Kamal Acha­nta beat England’s Liam Pitchford 4-1 in the men’s singles table tennis gold-medal match.

The best two weeks of my 40 years of life,” said the winner, who won three golds and a silver in Birmingham.“It can’t get better.”

Birmingham 2022 CEO Ian Reid said the Games had been a huge boost for the city and the surrounding area.

He said more than 1.5 million tickets had been sold, with most venues above 90 percent capacity.

One of the goals at the outset was to put the city on the world map and instil that huge pride across everyone that lives in the region and I think we’ve achieved that,” he told a briefing on Monday. I think that can lead to much bigger and greater things.”

On Sunday, Australia won the first women’s cricket gold medal in Commonwealth Games history as Scotland’s Laura Muir captured the 1500m title on the final night of athletics.

Elsewhere, England’s women won hockey gold and Australia beat Jamaica in the netball final.

Hot favourites Australia held their nerve to beat India by nine runs in a Twenty20 thriller in front of a big Edgbaston crowd and partied on the pitch as the lights went out around the stadium.

It’s absolutely huge,” said left-arm spinner Jess Jonassen. We are blessed enough to be part of some winning World Cup teams but to win the first gold medal for women’s cricket in the Common­wealth Games, you’re only ever going to do that once.”

Victory underlined the dominance of Australia’s women, who are also world champions in the 20-over and 50-over formats.

Muir ended her Common­wealth Games campaign with a flourish by winning gold in the 1500m at the Alexander Stadium.

The 29-year-old’s team-mate, 10,000m champion Eilish McColgan, just failed in her bid for memorable double, finishing second behind Kenya’s impressive world silver medallist Beatrice Chebet in the women’s 5,000m.

Muir, who won bronze in the 800m on Saturday, kicked for glory before the bell and ran a fairly moderate field — lacking two-time Olympic champion Faith Kipyegon — ragged, timing 4min 02.75sec.

Wyclife Kinyamal defended his men’s 800m crown in a time of 1:47.52. It was an impressive turnaround for the 25-year-old, who finished last in the final of the world championships in July.

New Zealand cyclist Aaron Gate won the men’s road race to collect his fourth gold medal of the Commonwealth Games. In the women’s race, Australia’s Georgia Baker won her third gold of the games.

England won hockey gold for the first time after holding off a fightback from Australia to win 2-1.

Second-quarter goals from Holly Hunt and Tess Howard ultimately provided decisive 24 hours after the men’s team had suffered semi-final despair at the hands of Australia.

There was more joy for Australia in the netball competition, with a 55-51 over Jamaica in the final.

Australia also shone at the Sandwell Aquatics Centre. Cassiel Rousseau took the men’s 10m platform title and Maddison Keeney won her second gold of the games in the women’s 3m springboard.

England’s Delicious Orie won super heavyweight gold on a busy night of boxing, beating India’s Sagar Ahlawat.

India won three other golds in boxing but Northern Ireland took five, including a special double for Aidan Walsh and his sister Michaela.

Final standings

Tabulated under (position, country, gold, silver, bronze, total medals)1 Australia 67 57 54 178
2 England 57 66 53 176
3 Canada 26 32 34 92
4 India 22 16 23 615 New Zealand 20 12 17 49
6 Scotland 13 11 27 51
7 Nigeria 12 9 14 35
8 Wales 8 6 14 28
9 South Africa 7 9 11 27
10 Malaysia 7 8 8 23
11 Northern Ireland 7 7 4 18
12 Jamaica 6 6 3 15
13 Kenya 6 5 10 21
14 Singapore 4 4 4 12
15 Trinidad and Tobago 3 2 1 6
16 Uganda 3 0 2 5
17 Cyprus 2 3 6 11
18 Pakistan 2 3 3 8
19 Samoa 1 4 0 5
20 Barbados 1 1 1 3
20 Cameroon 1 1 1 3
20 Zambia 1 1 1 3
23 Grenada 1 1 0 2
23 The Bahamas 1 1 0 2
25 Bermuda 1 0 1 2
26 British Virgin Islands 1 0 0 1
27 Mauritius 0 3 2 5
28 Ghana 0 2 3 5
29 Fiji 0 2 2 4
30 Mozambique 0 2 1 3
31 Sri Lanka 0 1 3 4
32 United Republic of Tanzania 0 1 2 3
33 Botswana 0 1 1 2
33 Guernsey 0 1 1 2
35 Dominica 0 1 0 1
35 Papua New Guinea 0 1 0 1
35 St Lucia 0 1 0 1
35 The Gambia 0 1 0 1
39 Namibia 0 0 4 4
40 Malta 0 0 1 1
40 Nauru 0 0 1 1
40 Niue 0 0 1 1
40 Vanuatu 0 0 1 1

Published in Dawn, August 9th, 2022