Randall and Allison finish 11th at World Championships

GREAT Britain's Jenna Randall and Olivia Allison just missed out on their target top ten finish in the synchronised swimming duet event at the World Championships in Rome.

RIGHT DIRECTION: Great Britain's synchro swimming duet have benefitted from their time in Russia

But the pair, who were 14th at last year's Beijing Olympics, will be happy they've climbed a couple of placings on the rankings after scoring 89.166 to finish 11th.

The British duo have been training with the powerful Russian team in recent weeks and they won gold as Anastasia Davydova and Svetlana Romashina continued their country's domination of the event.

Spain's Andrea Fuentes and Gemma Mengual won silver and China's Jiang Tingting and Jiang Wenwen secured bronze.

“That was a lot better than yesterday,” said Allison, after Great Britain finished above the USA for the first time ever at this level.

“It was a calmer performance from both of us and yesterday we were quite nervous. It was a lot better and we were more in control. 

“It is really good to come back to the World Championships and to move up nine places in two years which shows our improvement which is great.”

The team combination event preliminaries saw Great Britain, who were first to perform, finish in seventh place and secure their final spot.

 
They performed the routine with increased and impressive intensity to finish to scores of high eights and nine and secured a final score of 88.833.

Spain were the top ranked qualifiers, ahead of China and Canada.
 
“That felt really good out there,” said Lauren Smith.

“I really enjoyed it and it was a good fun routine.

"Being first isn’t something we really think about. We are really prepared for anything and when you are down in the call room it doesn’t occur to you that you are first out. You just deal with it and move on."