Tonga make their Commonwealth netball debut, India enter a Commonwealth team sport for the first time, and Niue’s first medallist returns to the ring. There are also stories of maternity, migration and sporting reinvention across a programme featuring swimming, gymnastics, boxing, netball, bowls and 3x3 basketball.

Tonga step onto the netball court

Tonga’s opening match against defending champions Australia is about more than the result.

This is the country’s first appearance in Commonwealth Games netball, a major achievement for a nation of just over 100,000 people which has climbed into the world’s top 10.

Captain Hulita Veve will lead the team into Glasgow after a journey shaped by family and loss. She stepped away from netball at 21 to have her first son, while her father’s death from brain cancer later gave her another reason to return. Playing internationally had been his dream for her, although Veve did not initially realise she was eligible to represent Tonga.

Saturday gives her the chance to fulfil it on the Commonwealth stage.

A 3x3 first for India and Wales

When India face Wales in women’s wheelchair 3x3 basketball, neither team will have experienced anything quite like it. The match marks both nations' Commonwealth wheelchair basketball debut, giving the contest a significance that stretches far beyond the group standings.

For both countries, Glasgow represents the beginning of something new. The result matters, but so does the opportunity to establish programmes, create visibility and show what might be possible at future Games.

Niue’s history-maker returns

Duken Tutakitoa-Williams changed Niuean sporting history at Birmingham 2022 when he won bronze in boxing, becoming the island’s first Commonwealth Games medallist in any sport.

He begins another campaign on Saturday in the men’s light-heavyweight division, carrying the expectations of a nation with a population of fewer than 2,000 people.

His Birmingham medal showed how one athlete can transform the place a small nation occupies within the Games. Glasgow gives him the chance to prove that breakthrough was not a one-off.

Sri Lanka’s new gymnastics hope

 

 

 

 

Tiana Sumanasekera brings a rare level of experience to Sri Lanka’s women’s artistic gymnastics team.

The 18-year-old UCLA freshman grew up in California and trained at the World Champions Centre alongside Simone Biles and Jordan Chiles. She also represented the United States at junior level, helping the team win gold at the 2025 Pan American Championships.

Sumanasekera has since switched allegiance to Sri Lanka, the country of her parents, and will make her Commonwealth Games debut in Glasgow. Her arrival gives Sri Lanka an athlete shaped by one of the strongest gymnastics programmes in the world and a genuine opportunity to raise the profile of the sport at home.

Mary Cholhok carries Uganda’s hopes

At 6ft 7in, Mary Cholhok is one of the most recognisable players in world netball. Her journey to Saturday’s opening match against Wales began much further away from the international court.

Cholhok fled South Sudan for Uganda as a child and did not begin playing netball until her early teens. She later moved to Britain to develop her career before establishing herself in Australia.

She also stepped away from the sport to have her son before returning to international competition. Now she is central to a Ugandan side looking to build on its fifth-place finish at Birmingham 2022, the country’s best result at a Commonwealth Games.

Bethany Firth returns after motherhood

 

 

 

 

Bethany Firth won Northern Ireland’s first Commonwealth swimming gold at Birmingham 2022. Four years later, she returns after missing the Paris Paralympics following the birth of her daughter.

Any doubts over her form were answered when she set a world record in the 100m backstroke shortly before Glasgow. On Saturday, she contests the S14 200m freestyle against an English challenge led by Paralympic champion Poppy Maskill and Louise Fiddes.

The event brings together one of the strongest fields of the day, but Firth’s presence carries particular significance. She is not simply defending a title. She is returning to the stage on which she made history, this time as a mother.

Can Nowacki end Jersey’s 36-year wait?

Adam Peaty will command most of the attention in the men’s 100m breaststroke final, but Filip Nowacki has already shown he belongs alongside him.

The 18-year-old pushed the former Olympic champion all the way in their semi-final and now has the chance to win Jersey’s first Commonwealth Games medal since 1990.

Nowacki arrived in Glasgow as the world junior champion over 100m and 200m breaststroke and the British 200m champion. A medal on Saturday would end a 36-year wait for Jersey and confirm his emergence as one of the leading young swimmers in the Commonwealth.