Olympics bronze medal joy for Kristian Thomas

Wolverhampton's Kristian Thomas and his Team GB teammates won Great Britain's first men's Olympic gymnastics team medal in a century when they claimed bronze at the North Greenwich Arena this evening.

Thomas, along with Louis Smith, Max Whitlock, Daniel Purvis and Sam Oldham scored a total of 271.711 as they produced a stunning team performance.

Britain had initially been awarded silver but an inquiry into the score of Kohei Uchimura's pommel horse routine saw Japan claim silver and Britain downgraded to bronze. China retained their gold medal.

The Duke of Cambridge and Prince Harry led the support as Britain won their first Olympic team medal since the bronze at the Stockholm Games in 1912 to thunderous applause from the home crowd.

Thomas said: "We thought we'd got a silver and then we got bumped down to bronze but right now if someone had offered me a bronze medal at the start of the day I would have taken it. Who cares now? I've got an Olympic bronze medal, I couldn't care if it was silver or bronze. I've got a medal.

"I tried my hardest not to look at the scoreboard in the whole competition but then just after the bar I couldn't resist and then though 'I wish I hadn't have looked now'.

"We knew with clean routines we'd do well. We just kept hitting our routines. We dealt with the pressure, surrounding and the nerves – everything which comes with this competition.

"I knew I had to deliver a clean routine at the end but I heard the crowd and that gave me such a massive lift. The crowd played a massive part in our success."