14-year-old Zhang Jiaqi received the perfect birthday gift today, as the young talent made a dream debut at the FINA Diving World Cup 2018 by earning the women's 10m gold medal in Wuhan on Wednesday June 6.

Zhang, who just celebrated her birthday on May 28, dominated the field from the semi-final to the final. With her trade-mark clean entries, Zhang never met challenges and claimed her first world title with a total of 427.30 points, while Olympic champion Ren Qian (CHN) finished second in 403.85 and Pamg Pandelela of Malaysia took the bronze in 349.15.

"I felt a little bit nervous which made my entries not as clean as what I usually do during the training. I am happy with the victory though as it is my first world title. I hope I can do better in the upcoming Asian Games and hopefully I can qualify for the Olympic Games," Zhang said.

"Usually I would like a Barbie doll for my birhtday but this victory is everything." Zhang added.

Photos credit: Xiong Qi (Xinhua)

For Ren, the silver medal was acceptable.

"I was satisfied with my overall performance of the final, except my fourth dive 6243D. But on the other hand, my 207C was better than I expected. I competed with myself and I was happy with the process of competition."

"I am taller and heavier than I was two years ago in Rio when I won the gold, so I have to get used to it," said the 17-year-old.

In the men's 3m springboard preliminary, defending champion Rommel Pacheco placed 10th while reigning runner-up Yona Knight-Wisdom of Jamaica failed to qualify for the semi-final with a 28th finish. World champion Xie Siyi and Olympic champion Cao Yuan were the top two among 34 divers.

"I am a little bit frustrated. I changed two of my dives with more difficulties, but during the whole year, I did not dive them very consistently. My height [190cm] challenged me on the difficult dives. I hope I can do better next time," said Knight-Wisdom, who made history two years ago as the first ever Jamaica diver to win a medal at a world competition, or the tallest medallist in diving history.