It was fourth place for Scotland in the Men’s Team Event, but despite missing out on the medal they so desperately wanted, and by the smallest of margins, it was a performance the quintet of Hamish Carter, Pavel Karnejenko, Cameron Lynn, Connor Sullivan and Reuben Ward could be extremely proud of.

Cameron Lynn was first up for Scotland on the Floor, a strong opening routine setting the tone, before he encouraged the crowd to get behind the Scottish team, which brought a roaring response and continued throughout the four-hour competition.

Onto the Pommel, and the boys turned up the dial a notch, Reuben Ward, the reigning British Champion in the discipline, topping the leaderboard with a truly world class performance scoring 14.550, which saw them top the standings in that apparatus.

Unfortunately a couple of landings went ary on the Rings, which left the quintet with work to do if they wanted to make a trip to the podium at the end of evening, but a solid Vault put them within two points of podium with two apparatus to go.

On the Parallel Bars, the men got the crowd behind them again as they produced the third best score to reduce the gap to exactly one point to Australia in third. Heading into the High Bar, the team had half an eye on the pommel as they looked to leapfrog their southern hemisphere counterparts.

With the Glasgow crowd roaring them on, they summed four outstanding High Bar performances to top the charts in the discipline, but unfortunately they couldn’t quite overhaul Australia and make it onto the podium.

Emotions were running high post-competition, but the team bond was evident as Connor said: “It was a rollercoaster out there, highs and lows but to share it with these guys has been something really special. The build-up and the friendship we’ve built over these last weeks and couple of years have been something special.”

Reuben said: “I think I might have said I’m proud about 500 times, but it was just really special. I think over the past 7 weeks, it might have been some of the best weeks of my life, genuinely. To just chill with these guys, train with these guys, it’s such a privilege and to be out there today with those guys is just a privilege, and I don’t take it for granted and I’m sure Connor doesn’t either. We might have fallen short but my heart is still full and I’m still full of joy and proud for every single one of them.

“My goal for today was nothing to do with a medal; it was to enjoy it and be proud of how I’ve performed – whether that was competing successful routines or just the way I operated today and I absolutely achieved that. That goes into the next few days as well as competing in the all around final, the floor, the pommel and p-bars. I want to inspire the younger generation; I want to prove that Scottish gymnastics can be a great country for gymnastics and I just want to show that because I know it myself.”

Cammy said: “As soon as I got out there and saw all the Scottish flags and some friends sitting in the stands, I couldn’t help myself and I wanted to get the crowd geed up ready to go, especially for the boys coming after me. I wanted to use that crowd as momentum to really strive for that team medal and obviously, we fell a bit short of that today, but listen these boys have been through so much with me together, it’s been such a journey and I’ve been loving every single moment.”

“It’s always nice to have some finals, I’m looking forward to it. We’ve got three more opportunities to try win our country some medals out there and, as Reuben says, show that Scottish gymnastics is someone to be reckoned with – we’re out here to try and prove that over the next few days.”

Hamish said: “It was once in a lifetime opportunity to be out there. We didn’t get a medal, we really wanted it and we’d been believing it the whole prep. Truly living the dream with these guys in this preparation, so it definitely stings to not be rewarded in a way that we really feel like we deserved. But having said that, we did make mistakes out there as a team. To me it doesn’t matter now as that was one of the best experiences of my career to share it with these guys. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, whether it was 1st, 4th or last, I wouldn’t have had it any other way, that was something truly special and to do it in front of a Scottish crowd is a privilege. I’m just gutted that we couldn’t stand on the podium and see that today.”

On Saturday it is the turn of the women in Team Event, before the All-Around on Sunday, which both Reuben Ward and Cameron Lynn qualified for after their efforts this evening. Ward will also go in three individual apparatus finals later in the week, with Lynn also progressing to two finals.