US win basketball and football gold as GB earn six medals on day 15

The United States claimed gold in the women’s football and men’s basketball as Great Britain and Northern Ireland won medals in artistic swimming, athletics, diving and taekwondo on day 15 of the Paris Olympics. The United States maintained their grip on the Olympic men’s basketball title by overwhelming hosts France to win a fifth successive gold medal in Paris. A star-studded American team packed with NBA icons, led by LeBron James and Stephen Curry, demonstrated their quality to win 98-87 amid a febrile atmosphere at Bercy Arena. GB’s first ever medal in artistic swimming arrived as Kate Shortman and Izzy Thorpe took silver with an exquisite free routine in the duet. Noah Williams won Britain’s first medal of the day – and his second of the Games – with bronze in the men’s 10m platform diving final. Meanwhile, Caden Cunningham narrowly missed out on becoming the first British man to win Olympic taekwondo gold as he took silver in the +80kg category. Georgia Bell ran a British record time to earn 1500m bronze, while both the men’s and women’s 4x400m quartets also claimed bronze medals on the final night of track and field at the Games. Great Britain have now won 63 medals – one fewer than they secured at the Tokyo Olympics – with one day to go. Team GB are sixth in the medal table with 14 golds, 22 silvers and 27 bronzes. If they can win five medals on day 16, the 2024 squad will overtake the record overseas tally of 67 medals achieved at Rio 2016.