Matthew Horsman

Seven days ago, it was all going a bit too well. There was no looming media presence surrounding the England national football team demanding that they win the World Cup. We had even skirted around the minefield of the country’s 24-year-old captain claiming they could win in Russia – everything was brewing for a sensible summer of progress on the pitch and a dose of realism off it.

Captaining your country at a home games – it doesn’t get much better than that for an athlete. In 2014, Scottish men’s hockey captain Chris Grassick did exactly that at the Glasgow Commonwealth Games, an experience he still relishes to this day. “It was really special,” he said. “It was a proud couple of weeks.

The beauty of the Commonwealth Games lies in the number of athletes competing who can genuinely class themselves as amateurs right at the top of their sport. Zach Courtney, a man mountain from the Scottish capital of Edinburgh, certainly falls into this category. Currently studying podiatry at Queen Margaret University on the banks of the Firth of Forth, Courtney is on his way to his first Commonwealth Games to proudly represent Scotland on the Gold Coast as a weightlifter.