Olympic champion hails GB's Daley

By Mike Henson

Daley's new personal best would have secured him gold in the Beijing final

Olympic diving champion Matthew Mitcham expects British youngster Tom Daley to emerge as a serious rival in the build-up to the 2012 Games.

"Tom's a huge threat. He's a phenomenal diver - not just for his age, but in his own right," Mitcham told BBC Sport.

"He is going to be huge competition in Sheffield, in the Commonwealth Games, through to London and beyond."

The pair, along with Chinese star Luxin Zhou, compete in the third round of the World Series in Sheffield this weekend.

Daley, 14, finished seventh behind Mitcham and Zhou in the Beijing pool last summer, but showed he is still improving on his prodigious talent with a personal best of 540.70 in the World Series in Changzhou last month.

606: DEBATE Give your predictions for the Sheffield event

"I didn't reach the achievements I have until I was 20 and he's already reached similar achievements when he's 14," said Mitcham.

"He's got so much talent from the start it depends what he does with it, he could be unstoppable. But the kind of person that Tom is, I don't think he will waste his talent."

Mitcham will be hoping to break Zhou's dominance of the World Series in Ponds Forge after the Olympic silver medallist took victory in the first two rounds.

Daley will also make his first competitive outing with Max Brick in the synchronised event after ending his partnership with Blake Aldridge in the wake of the Olympics.

The four-stage competition comes to a climax in Mexico on 24 and 25 April with the the eventual winners receiving welcome cash prizes in a mostly amateur sport.