Hayley Sage and Tandi Indergaard came close to winning silver

The pair had a superb final dive to put them in the hunt for silver but Canada's Melanie Rinaldi and Rebecca Barras kept their cool to claim second.

Indergaard and Sage ended up on 270.63 points, 25.44 behind winners Bree Cole and Charleen Stratton of Australia.

Meanwhile, Peter Waterfield missed out on bronze in the one metre springboard.

"It hasn't sunk in yet," said the 28-year-old Indergaard, who represented South Africa in the 1998 Games. "I'm really excited because it's a new team.

It's great to win something in our first event Hayley Sage

"Rounds two and three were a bit wobbly but we pulled it back. We had to fight for that medal.

"We made a mistake on our second dive which hurt our score but we came back strongly."

Sage, 19, is one of the team's newest members and was delighted to have claimed her first senior international medal.

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"I am shellshocked," she said. "We are just so happy. We just had to try and stay focused.

"We are quite new as a partnership and have worked so hard in training. It's great to win something in our first event."

England's Claire Blencowe and Katherine Hamilton finished fifth with a score of 248.25 on their major Games debut.

Waterfield, Commonwealth champion in the 10m platform, suffered heartbreak after he gambled on his final dive.

Waterfield's gamble did not pay off in Melbourne

The 25-year-old was in third place going into it but only 4.35 points ahead of Australia's Steve Barnett.

He committed himself to the most testing dive attempted by any competitor in the final round and failed to get the necessary height.

"That last dive if you don't get the right take-off, you can't do it," he said.

"It can go two ways - it can go well or it can go really badly and it went really badly."

World champion Alexandre Despatie of Canada comfortably won the gold while Malaysia's Yeoh Ken Nee took silver.

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Ben Swain of Sheffield finished sixth while Plymouth's Gareth Hones was 10th.

Waterfield will now concentrate on defending his 10m platform title on Saturday.

England suffered more disappointment in the women's 10m synchronised platform when Stacie Powell and Tonia Couch came fourth while Sarah Barrow and Brooke Graddon were fifth.

Australian pair Chantelle Newbery and Loudy Tourky took gold.

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