Diver Tom plummets into last place

Among the disappointed British spectators were Team Daley - 12 of the schoolboy's family, including his mother Debbie, father Rob, his brothers, 12-year-old William and nine-year-old Ben and grandparents, Dougie and Jenny Silvester and Dave and Rose Daley.

His mentor, former Olympian Leon Taylor, was also among spectators.

A 13-year-old swimmer from the Seychelles is the only competitor younger than Daley in Beijing.

Two former British summer Olympics competitors were younger than Daley but neither won a medal.

Kenneth Lester was 13 years and 144 days old when he coxed in a rowing heat in Rome in 1960, and Margery Hinton was 13 years and 43 days old when she swam in the 200m breaststroke in Amsterdam in 1928.

Daley, from Plymouth, is 5ft1in and weighs 104lb, a featherweight beside other platform divers and Aldridge, whose previous partner was killed in a hit- and- run incident last year.

Aldridge was also watched by his family, who flew to China from London. The world champion learned to dive at five years of age and at 17 he won the junior world diving championships in the Czech Republic.

As a senior he has won medals at every European championship he has competed in. He also finished 3rd at the Olympic trials in 2004.

At the Aquatics Centre today, each pair performed six synchronised dives, which became progressively more difficult and were marked according to the degree of difficulty multiplied by the eight judges' scores.

Daley, whose popularity had soared before even taking his first Olympic dive, previously said: "In China diving is a quite big sport so walking around the streets you do sometimes get recognised - in the village as well and at the diving pool some of the Chinese staff recognise you a bit.

"It's kind of weird because when you're little you always dream of being that person up there, being more famous. And it is weird to start getting that, to start being recognised, as you don't really expect it to happen."