Gold Coast 2018 Commonwealth Games on the BBC

• BBC Sport unveils its broadcast plans for the Gold Coast 2018 Commonwealth Games
• Clare Balding, Hazel Irvine, Gabby Logan, Jason Mohammad and JJ Chalmers front live TV coverage
• Live commentary on Radio 5 live from Steve Parry, Allison Curbishley and team
• BBC Sport online features live video coverage of all the best action

The BBC today announced its extensive Commonwealth Games coverage which will play out across TV, radio and digital - bringing more than 200 hours of coverage across BBC One, BBC Two, BBC Red Button, BBC Sport website, iPlayer and radio.

A mix of new and familiar BBC Sport faces will provide the best analysis, insight, news and highlights, in a mix of live and on-demand action delivered to audiences wherever and whenever they want it.

Leading the TV offering are Clare Balding, Gabby Logan and Jason Mohammad live from BBC Sport HQ in Salford with Hazel Irvine and JJ Chalmers live in Queensland. TV coverage runs daily from midnight until 8pm across BBC One and BBC Two for the 11-day duration of the Commonwealth Games, featuring a regular evening highlights show at 6.30pm on BBC Two*. BBC Four will then show a further hour of Games action from 8pm.

Alongside this, the BBC Red Button provides a full round the clock schedule of live and catch-up programming throughout the Games.

Clare, Hazel, Gabby, Jason and JJ are joined by a host of world-class commentators and pundits who bring their own wealth of experience and unique insight to the conversation. The TV line-up includes athletics greats Michael Johnson, Steve Cram, Jess Ennis-Hill, Steve Backley, Colin Jackson, Denise Lewis, Paula Radcliffe and Katharine Merry.

Away from track and field, other sporting greats providing expert analysis will include Sir Chris Hoy and Chris Boardman on the velodrome action, Rebecca Adlington and Mark Foster poolside and Beth Tweddle and Craig Heap at the gymnastics.

Radio coverage of the Commonwealth Games will be broadcast on BBC Radio 5 live. The 5 live Breakfast programme will be the first to bring listeners overnight key activity from the Gold Coast, followed by live commentary of the best of the day’s action across the daytime schedules. Commentary comes from Steve Parry, Allison Curbishley, Rob Hatch, John Hunt, Ed Harry and Sara Orchard.

The UK’s biggest digital sports service, BBC Sport online, will live stream all the key moments of the Commonwealth Games to desktops, tablets, mobiles and connected TVs, with audiences also able to watch live on BBC iPlayer or via the Red Button.

BBC Sport online will also offer on-demand video clips, live reporting and analysis so that audiences can catch up with the Games at any time by visiting the website or downloading the BBC Sport app where they can personalise the offering.

With a collective reach of around 30 million, BBC Sport’s social media channels will distribute some of the best moments of the Games as they happen, straight to mobile.

Barbara Slater, Director of BBC Sport, says: “The Commonwealth Games are a hugely popular sporting event for people across the UK. Our unrivalled cross-platform offer will transport audiences to the Gold Coast and put them at the heart of the action to follow their sporting heroes throughout 11 days of top class competition.”

KS

*schedules may vary, please check listings for details

England medal hopes

Adam Peaty
Swimming

The 23-year-old appears well set to achieve his stated aim of “leaving a legacy in the sport that can’t be touched”. He is undefeated in major championships since 2014 and won the 100m breaststroke gold medal at the Rio Olympics in a world record time. He also holds the breaststroke world record over 50m and has five World Championship, nine European and two Commonwealth titles to his name.

Women’s hockey team

England’s women won a first Olympic gold representing Great Britain in 2016, when they dramatically beat defending champions the Netherlands in a penalty shootout. Next in their sights is a first Commonwealth title, having finished second or third in the five previous attempts. The team won bronze at the 2017 EuroHockey Championships in Amsterdam, while Maddy Finch was recently voted by the public and her peers as the best female goalkeeper in the world for a second consecutive year.

Max Whitlock
Gymnastics

Whitlock is promising “huge upgrades” to his routines despite ending Great Britain’s wait for an Olympic gymnastics gold medal by winning two in as many hours in Rio. He returned from a year’s break after that historic success on the floor and pommel horse to become the first British gymnast to retain a world title with victory in the pommel in Montreal last October. The 25-year-old won Commonwealth gold in the team, all-around and floor four years ago but his focus in April is on attempting the hardest pommel horse routine ever seen on the international stage.

Alistair Brownlee
Triathlon

The reigning Commonwealth champion will start as favourite to retain the title despite focusing on the endurance Ironman events since winning a second successive Olympic gold medal in summer 2016. Hip surgery curtailed his season last year but he is now fit and motivated for a tilt at glory over the sprint distance of 750m swim, 20km bike ride and 5km run - half the traditional Olympic distance. Brownlee and younger brother Jonny will also be expected to help England retain the mixed relay title.

Tom Daley
Diving

Daley claimed his first individual World Championship title for eight years last summer, leading all the way to defeat Olympic champion Chen Aisen in the 10m platform. It was a magnificent riposte to his shock elimination in the semi-finals of the same event at the Olympic Games just 11 months earlier. The 23-year-old is vying for a third successive individual Commonwealth title, as well as attempting to emulate his 2010 gold in the synchronised event – Daley and current diving partner Daniel Goodfellow earned bronze at the 2016 Olympics.

Northern Ireland medal hopes

James McGivern
Boxing

Northern Ireland won nine boxing medals at the 2014 Games, more than any other nation, and stylish southpaw James McGivern is among the talented new crop of youngsters to emerge. McGivern announced himself on the senior scene when he took the Ulster Elite title and the Best Boxer award in November following a classy win over Commonwealth Games bronze medallist Sean Duffy in the lightweight (60kg) final. The 20-year-old’s stated aim is to become the first Northern Ireland boxer to follow up gold at the Commonwealth Youth Games by winning the senior title. “In my head at least, I’m the biggest threat there is,” he says of his chances in April.

Michaela Walsh
Boxing

The 24-year-old from Belfast will be looking to upgrade her silver from Glasgow 2014 after losing a split decision against two-time Olympic champion Nicola Adams in the final. Walsh returned from a lengthy injury absence to win gold at the European Union Championships in Italy last August, becoming the first Irishwoman other than Katie Taylor to claim a major senior title. She has since stepped up to featherweight in preparation for the 2020 Olympic Games. Her brother Aidan is also in the squad for Gold Coast.

David Calvert
Shooting

The 67-year-old former RAF pilot will be seeking a ninth shooting medal in his record-extending 11th Games. The Belfast native has been selected for every Commonwealth Games since his debut in 1978, winning four gold medals. He will compete in the full-bore rifle individual and pairs event.

Scotland medal hopes

Katie Archibald
Cycling

The reigning Olympic, world and European champion will lead Scotland’s medal chances in the Velodrome, along with fellow Rio 2016 gold medallist Callum Skinner, and also plans to compete on the road. The free-spirited endurance rider has 17 major medals, many as part of Great Britain’s all-conquering team pursuit line-up, and has targeted the individual pursuit, scratch race and points race on the track at the Commonwealth Games.

Maria Lyle
Athletics

This prodigious 18-year-old para sprinter has already earned three Paralympic and five World Championship medals, as well as triple European gold in 2016. The Dunbar teenager, who has cerebral palsy, self-effacingly describes herself as “your average Scottish lassie - with dodgy legs.” She will compete in the T35 100m in Gold Coast, where she will face Australian nemesis Isis Holt.

Alex Marshall
Lawn bowls

The East Lothian legend needs one more gold medal to surpass sprinter Alan Wells and earn a Scottish record fifth Commonwealth Games title. ‘Tattie’ Marshall, 51, clinched the pairs title for a third time in 2014, when he was also part of the gold medal-winning men’s four. He has been one of the world’s best lawn bowlers for nearly 20 years, earning an unprecedented six world indoor singles titles.

Wales medal hopes

Elinor Barker
Cycling

The 23-year-old from Cardiff supplemented her Olympic team pursuit gold medal with her first individual world title in 2017, winning the points race in Hong Kong. She also took silver medals in the scratch and madison, and was crowned European champion in the latter event in October. In total, she has three world and four European titles to go with her Olympic gold.

Jazz Carlin
Swimming

Carlin and fellow swimmer Georgia Davies are the only two of Wales’ five gold medallists from 2014 who will be returning to the Games. Carlin, 27, took gold and silver in the 800m and 400m freestyle respectively four years ago. The first Welsh woman to win Commonwealth gold in the pool for 40 years, she went on to earn two silver medals at the Rio Olympics over the same two freestyle events.

Tesni Evans
Squash

The 25-year-old is the highest-ranked Welsh woman of all time in squash, and on the cusp of breaking into the world’s top 10. She reached the World Championship quarter-finals last year, and this February became the first British champion from Wales in the event’s 43-year history. The Rhyl-based athlete defeated three former winners in straight sets on her way to the title, including world number four Laura Massaro of England. She will compete in the singles, women’s doubles and mixed doubles in Gold Coast.

Guernsey medal hopes

Matt Solway and Matt Le Ber
Lawn bowls

Solway and Le Ber retained their European title in the men’s pairs last September and are arguably the Channel Island’s best prospects of a first Commonwealth Games medal since 1994. It will be a Commonwealth debut for Solway but a fifth successive Games for Le Ber, who was seventh in the singles in 2010.

Isle of Man medal hopes

Mark Cavendish
Road cycling

The celebrated Manx rider is a former road race world champion and has 30 stage wins at the Tour de France, second only to Eddy Merckx's record of 34. He will continue to pursue that mark in July but will first compete at the Commonwealth Games as a matter of “national pride”. Two of the Isle of Man’s three golds have come in cycling, with Cavendish winning the most recent on the track in the scratch race in 2006. Despite glandular fever ruining his 2017 season, few would bet against Cavendish returning stronger than before.

Jersey medal hopes

Barry Le Cheminant
Shooting

The 53-year-old came close in 2014 to earning Jersey’s first medal since 1990. In his first Commonwealth Games appearance for 28 years, Le Cheminant led the individual full-bore event after two days, only to slip down to seventh in strong winds. He will be competing in Australia at the same Brisbane venue where he made his Commonwealth debut in 1982. Le Cheminant will be joined in the pairs event by David Le Quesne, who was fourth in 2002.