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Daley undergoing therapy for 'terrifying' twist dive

Tom Daley labelled his twist routine as the 'demon dive' © PA Photos

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Tom Daley has revealed he is undergoing therapy to deal with his twist dive "phobia" because he is "literally terrified" of it.

Daley missed out on a medal on his competitive return to the London Aquatic Centre after he finished fifth in the final of the 10-metre platform at the Diving World Series on Sunday.

The 19-year-old averaged 92.85 from his five other dives but it was the back two-and-a-half somersault, two-and-a-half twists from the pike position which thwarted him again. Daley scored 61.2 for the twist dive, the same one which he had to repeat at the 2012 Olympics following a camera flash from the crowd. He admitted he is desperately seeking help to eradicate his fear.

"The scale of this issue is massive," Daley said. "I'm trying every single thing possible to try and get it back to normal. I'm going under different types of therapy.

"It is almost trauma therapy - to get myself to process the things that have gone wrong on it to get it to a stage where I can forget about it and feel positive about it.

"I am literally terrified of it. I suppose you could call it a phobia and I don't know what my heart rate is when I go up there and do it but it's definitely above 180, something ridiculous, because it is so terrifying."

Jane Figueiredo, who coaches the Brit, expressed her concern over Daley's self-labelled 'demon dive' but insisted they will find a solution.

"We are going to keep working hard to overcome this issue," Figueiredo told BBC Sport. "I want him to show more love towards it and not think of it as the 'demon dive' and I'm confident we can get through this together."

Daley will miss the upcoming World Series event in Moscow after he admitted suffering concussion during training last week.

Jian Yang of China took gold in the 10m-platform in London with a new world record of 616.5.

© ESPN Sports Media Ltd